Caden's Strange Illness & Fasting

This boy gave us quite a scare this month.  He went 14 days without eating food.  The only thing he consumed in that time period was water, a few ounces of milk, and juice from juice boxes/pouches each day.  

On any normal day we have to slow him down on the eating.  He does not miss a meal.  One day we sat down for lunch and moments later he was having a panic attack and screaming out for help. He was screaming out prayers to God.  He kept saying he was choking and could not breathe.  

I thought maybe his throat got a scratch on from something he swallowed.  We waited to give it some time to heal.  By day five of him not eating we went into the ER.  They could find nothing wrong  and basically treated him for inflammation of the throat.  

A friend that is a pediatric nurse contacted me after hearing his symptoms and said she believed he had a virus called gingiomatitis.  All the symptoms matched.  The interesting thing is that once a child is traumatized and thinks they can not swallow they sometimes will simply refuse to try.  He went FOURTEEN days without food.  Finally, through tears, pleading, begging, and threatening to spank him I got him to taste some applesauce.  He only ate a little, but later asked for more.  That night he ate a burger.  Clearly this eating thing was in his head mostly.  

Almost two weeks have passed since I got him to go back to eating.  He is just now (in the last couple of days) stopped making excuses not to eat.  It has been a long road.  He lost a lot of weight but I am so thankful we can move forward and I can finally say he is well.