Giardiais... aka... a pain in the behind!

Well we have finally determined the cause of Carter's bowel issues... he has Giardia. Giardia is a parasite that lives in the intestines and causes diarrhea and abdominal cramping. Fortunately it is usually treated easily with medication. We are not sure how he got it, it is usually contracted from contaminated water sources, but it is carried in feces so he could have contracted it from playing in the dirt or somewhere else that could have been contaminated... pretty nasty if you think about it. Carter has finished his meds and now we get to do the stool sample AGAIN to make sure he no longer has it, as it is sometimes resistant to the medication. (I can hardly wait!!) The fact that Carter hasn't grown at all in the last year can probably be attributed to the parasite, so hopefully we will see a growth spurt in the near future. I feel really bad that he had to suffer for so long! I took him to the doctor at the end of last summer because he had had diarrhea for weeks and weeks and it was often really explosive (so much so that he couldn't always get to the toilet on time.) WELL, I don't know if my doctor just wasn't listening to me or what, but she told me that he was probably constipated and that I should give him a laxative! (Since when do you give kids with explosive diarrhea a laxative?!?) I seriously couldn't believe it, she was dead serious too... Needless to say we switched doctors!! Well we are happy to have it figured out and I am Really glad that it wasn't a gluten allergy or something terrible like that! (I had been bracing myself for the worst.)