Unexpected

Ellie started asking for food last week. She asked to be at the table for each meal, and to have something in front of her. And I had not had the time to figure out how to accommodate that. Meat, broth, and zucchini. I kept thinking and thinking and thinking......

Finally I decided that I would put the zucchini in the dehydrator and make a 'vegetable leather'. I did that this week. I boiled it down as best I could, but due to the high water content of the zucchini it still came out paper thin. I took the first tray and dumped it into the garbage in frustration. I kept the second tray to show J.

J came home from work and promplty said 'no! dont throw that away! its perfect! it will melt in her mouth and give her something to start with.' And so became 'zucchini paper'. The next day I plopped Ellie in her chair at meal time and gave her a plate full of tiny torn up pieces of zucchini paper. And she loved them. She would put them in her mouth and say 'mmmmmm' and 'goooook' (look). That first day she asked for them all-day-long. Occasionally the dry pieces would stick and I would offer her water.

But day two things were different. She wanted those zucchini paper pieces and would go find them in the pantry, but she would refuse her bottle of broth. As the day progressed I was puzzled: was it the elk meat? was it not enough fat in the broth? was it the dehydrated zucchini? Finally in late afternoon she started to make faces and then proceeded to projectile empty her stomach all over herself, the kitchen and me.

It took her a few hours to recover from that, and at one point I thought that perhaps she had the flu. Her stomach would just heave, and the memories of all those petrifying FPIES reactions came hurrying back. (I am convinced they scar a mom for life)

But with time she recovered.

I, on the other hand, was a sobbing mess of disappointment. The vomit was primarily zucchini paste and I should have known it would be hard for her to digest ( a sudden increase in the amount of vegetable intake) and to limit her. But the thrill of her asking for food and having something to give her clouded my judgement.

At this point I am not 100% sure if I had put too much fat in her broth or if she had too much zucchini paper. But today she is not asking for it. ooooooh, to know the future. To have seen it coming. For now we have zucchini paper in the pantry.