Oct 30, 2018
Boy Loses Hunger, Thirst Overnight
The mystery behind Landon Jones’s affliction
Landon Jones lived life like any other 12-year old boy. However, neither he nor his parents could have imagined the inexplicable occurrence that would take place on October 14, 2013.
The day before, Landon rode his bike and later ate some slices of pizza and a bowl of ice cream. However, the following morning, Landon woke up and discovered that he no longer felt hungry or thirsty.
“Something happened in the middle of the night,” Michael said, “and he woke up this way, and it hasn’t stopped.” — Michael, Landon’s father.
In addition to his loss of hunger and thirst, noted is that Landon felt dizzy to the point of almost passing out; his chest also clogged with phlegm that he kept coughing up.
Concerned, his parents took him for examination. An x-ray revealed a bacterial infection in Landon’s left lung. The infection got eradicated shortly afterward.
However, the family’s quest for answers would take them on countless doctor’s appointments — their local pediatrician in Waterloo; Cedar Rapids; Des Moines; Madison, Wis.; and the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.
With no clear answers still on the table, his parents have resorted to acting in place of his hypothalamus, encouraging him to eat and drink as often as they can. They routinely check his lunchbox to see how much he ate when neither are around. At school, his teacher was trained to make a secret hand signal to Landon throughout the school day to remind him to drink water during class.
Since losing his desire to eat or drink, Landon began losing weight. Going from 104 pounds down to 68 pounds, he started having less energy than his energetic younger brother and stopped participating in school activities due to getting dizzy.
Wanting nothing more than to be normal, his father even quit his job to have more time looking after his son.
In the year the mystery illness occurred, Landon ended up missing 65 school days due to affliction and his family’s quest for answers.
Amid the sea of calls, texts and emails from all over the world, one possible explanation might lead to a solution.
Scientist and engineer Sharon Churchill, working for the VA Medical Center in Battle Creek, Mich. thinks she knows what could have caused Landon’s affliction.
A year before his affliction, Landon was taking prescribed valproic acid to treat absence seizures. According to Churchill, a combination of Landon’s genetic predisposition and age at the time, with his intake of valproic acid and among other factors could have seriously upset the microbes in his upper intestinal tract. That led to his immune system getting affected, which could have then led to the bacterial infection. As a result, the chain of events affected his hypothalamus as well.
Regardless of the facts and possible answers, all this family wants is a definitive answer and solution to their son’s affliction.
*The most recent information on Landon’s affliction date back to 2014, as I can’t seem to find any updates past that. So, whether Landon has since gotten better or not, I can’t say for sure. However, I do hope his situation has at least gotten better somewhat.
