10/09/2022
After an afternoon hike with the boys, my oldest son stopped and said, "Mom, my headache is gone. I think I just needed to get into the wild."
This child has had to adapt to "outside the box" thinking when it comes to modern medicine. What was a scary moment in our lives has become a blessing for us as a family.
A few weeks prior to starting his Kindergarten year when he was 5, he was suddenly diagnosed with Steven Johnson Syndrome (SJS). With less than 20,000 cases in the US annually, this was a pretty serious & scary diagnosis. The SJS started with mild flu-like symptoms, then painful skin lesions ,which blister and shed, started to appear all over - his face, lips, around his eyes, body, even internally in his GI tract. When he woke up in the mornings, his lips would be completely & painfully scabbed over. We would have to start his morning with a warm bath just to get him where he could eat and drink properly. He would cry. He was unsually quiet. He didn't understand. It was a nightmare. He missed weeks of school and took months to fully recover.
During the assessment and diagnosis, the most likely cause of the SJS reaction was revealed - Ibuprofen we had given him for a viral fever that he had had a few weeks prior to the SJS symptoms.
8 years later, this child has avoided Ibuprofen, or any NSAID, nor Tylenol. He's learned to think differently. We all have. Unfortunately, there is not an available test (like allergy testing) to identify the exact trigger. Reintroduction of the medicine could retrigger another SJS outbreak more severe and even possibly fatal.
All of this led us to seek alternative ways to manage common discomforts. Balancing our diet, staying hydrated, ensuring we get plenty of exercise & sunshine, herbal medicine remedies are some of the many things we prioritize now.
We are so thankful that God kept Colter under His wing & that he was healed completely.
And I like to think we were as well.
