Food Allergy Worries
It has been way too long since I've blogged. Sorry! Been crazy busy with life. I have so many good things I want to blog about if I ever get to them. One being about an awesome new pump I got and one about carseat safety. But one I definitely would like to write about is food allergies. So I must say I never thought I would have to be a parent with a child of food allergies. Maybe seasonal allergies since I seem to have them really bad. Especially when I was growing up. Food allergies seem to be becoming more common thing in small children. My niece Sheridan has a dairy allergy. My cousin Luke has many various allergies to dairy, eggs, wheat, etc. It's crazy too when I go to schools for my job, how many students have food allergies. Pretty much every school now has a designated table for children with food allergies. It is crazy how common food allergies is becoming! I would love to do more research on food allergies one of these days, as to what is causing food allergies to become more of a common thing. But anyways the reason I am babbling on and on about food allergies, it has been officially confirmed that Holly has a food allergy.
My mother instinct suspected a possible milk allergy when Holly was about 6 weeks old. I'm not sure what made me think it was a dairy allergy. But I noticed she had really bad baby acne, and it seemed to get worse when I ate quite a bit of dairy (I breastfeed Holly) She also would get really fussy, and spit up a lot. And her bowel movements didn't look like the regular breastmilk stools. They were really mucusy looking. I've heard of babies having issues like that before when a mother had dairy in their diet. I was hoping that maybe this was something only with breastmilk, and maybe she would outgrow it when she was old enough to have dairy. So based on my suspicions, I ended up eliminating dairy from my diet. And I must say giving up dairy is one of the hardest things I've ever had to give up. I never realized how much dairy I consumed until I had to give it up. I was really hoping I would lose a bunch of weight since I wasn't eating any dairy, but I think I stock up on carbs instead which has not helped. :)
Since I have had my suspicions about her allergy I mentioned it to my pediatrician. He didn't seem too concern and acted like she would outgrow it by a year old. He actually told me to try having dairy again in my diet when Holly was 4 months old to see how she would react. I decided not to since I noticed she would react to even small amounts of dairy I consumed. And what really made me concerned is there were a few occasions where Holly has rashed up from direct contact of milk on her skin. I have never heard of an allergic reaction from direct skin contact with milk. I even mentioned this to the doctor and they thought it was strange and uncommon as well. One day she rashed up after Matt kissed her on the cheek. He just got done eating cereal with milk on it. Milk on his lips made her little face rash up. It is really nerve racking because Grant likes to spit out his milk or throw his cup and milk somehow splashes all over the place. Yesterday Grant was being a brat and decided to spit milk all over Holly's face. I quickly wiped it up. But within a half hour she got some hives around her chin and face. Part of me wants to go to to having a dairy free household. I hate to deprive Grant from his milk especially since he is a tiny little guy who doesn't eat very much. So the milk helps adds a supplement for him.
Anyways, Earlier in July, at a family picnic, Holly ended up having a bad allergic reaction. She broke out in hives, and started itched herself, and was inconsolable. I'm not sure what caused the reaction. I think it was because she had licked a spoon with pudding on it that one of my cousins had, but honestly, I'm not even sure if that is what happened and if it was something else. Regardless, I'm just glad we were able to get the reaction under control. I didn't have any Benadryl with me, so I had to run down the street and get some. Now I keep Benadryl on hand with me at all times! Because Holly had this scary reaction, to what I think was a small amount of milk, I called her ped. They ended up referring her to an allergist. The allergist ended up testing Holly for Milk, Eggs, Wheat, Soy and Peanuts. Holly of course reacted Milk. She ended up with the highest rating for it when they did the scratch test. But to my surprise she ended up reacting to eggs which I had no idea that she was allergic to those. So now I have to exclude eggs from my diet too since I am still breastfeeding her! Another food group out of my diet! Why not? I feel like I can't eat anything. My staple items have been pretzels and chicken.
So Holly has an epipen and will see the allergist in 6 months to get re-tested. The allergist thinks she may outgrow the milk allergy. I hope so. But the severity of it, makes me wonder if its going to be awhile before she outgrows it. Food allergies are stressful! I feel like I am constantly worrying about what Holly is trying to put in her mouth. (And this kid do seems to manage to find all kinds of weird food bits off the floor no matter how good I clean it!)
Having a kid with food allergies has definitely given me a new perspective on food allergy awareness. I never realized how much they change everyday living. Dairy and eggs are in so many of the foods that we eat! I am just glad that we know what Holly is officially allergic to, and I just hope that she doesn't develop additional allergies. Nor has any reactions to milk or eggs anytime soon. I think eggs and milk are enough to worry about! At least little Holly doesn't know what she is missing out on.
So that is my recent life in a nutshell. Food allergies is definitely a worrisome adventure that I never thought I would have to deal with. But now that I am, I feel like I am prepared to deal with it. And now that I have not had dairy products for over 7 months now, I feel like I could without them for quite a bit longer. I've gotten use to it's absence.
Bye for now! I'll try to post more enteries soon!
My mother instinct suspected a possible milk allergy when Holly was about 6 weeks old. I'm not sure what made me think it was a dairy allergy. But I noticed she had really bad baby acne, and it seemed to get worse when I ate quite a bit of dairy (I breastfeed Holly) She also would get really fussy, and spit up a lot. And her bowel movements didn't look like the regular breastmilk stools. They were really mucusy looking. I've heard of babies having issues like that before when a mother had dairy in their diet. I was hoping that maybe this was something only with breastmilk, and maybe she would outgrow it when she was old enough to have dairy. So based on my suspicions, I ended up eliminating dairy from my diet. And I must say giving up dairy is one of the hardest things I've ever had to give up. I never realized how much dairy I consumed until I had to give it up. I was really hoping I would lose a bunch of weight since I wasn't eating any dairy, but I think I stock up on carbs instead which has not helped. :)
Since I have had my suspicions about her allergy I mentioned it to my pediatrician. He didn't seem too concern and acted like she would outgrow it by a year old. He actually told me to try having dairy again in my diet when Holly was 4 months old to see how she would react. I decided not to since I noticed she would react to even small amounts of dairy I consumed. And what really made me concerned is there were a few occasions where Holly has rashed up from direct contact of milk on her skin. I have never heard of an allergic reaction from direct skin contact with milk. I even mentioned this to the doctor and they thought it was strange and uncommon as well. One day she rashed up after Matt kissed her on the cheek. He just got done eating cereal with milk on it. Milk on his lips made her little face rash up. It is really nerve racking because Grant likes to spit out his milk or throw his cup and milk somehow splashes all over the place. Yesterday Grant was being a brat and decided to spit milk all over Holly's face. I quickly wiped it up. But within a half hour she got some hives around her chin and face. Part of me wants to go to to having a dairy free household. I hate to deprive Grant from his milk especially since he is a tiny little guy who doesn't eat very much. So the milk helps adds a supplement for him.
Anyways, Earlier in July, at a family picnic, Holly ended up having a bad allergic reaction. She broke out in hives, and started itched herself, and was inconsolable. I'm not sure what caused the reaction. I think it was because she had licked a spoon with pudding on it that one of my cousins had, but honestly, I'm not even sure if that is what happened and if it was something else. Regardless, I'm just glad we were able to get the reaction under control. I didn't have any Benadryl with me, so I had to run down the street and get some. Now I keep Benadryl on hand with me at all times! Because Holly had this scary reaction, to what I think was a small amount of milk, I called her ped. They ended up referring her to an allergist. The allergist ended up testing Holly for Milk, Eggs, Wheat, Soy and Peanuts. Holly of course reacted Milk. She ended up with the highest rating for it when they did the scratch test. But to my surprise she ended up reacting to eggs which I had no idea that she was allergic to those. So now I have to exclude eggs from my diet too since I am still breastfeeding her! Another food group out of my diet! Why not? I feel like I can't eat anything. My staple items have been pretzels and chicken.
So Holly has an epipen and will see the allergist in 6 months to get re-tested. The allergist thinks she may outgrow the milk allergy. I hope so. But the severity of it, makes me wonder if its going to be awhile before she outgrows it. Food allergies are stressful! I feel like I am constantly worrying about what Holly is trying to put in her mouth. (And this kid do seems to manage to find all kinds of weird food bits off the floor no matter how good I clean it!)
Having a kid with food allergies has definitely given me a new perspective on food allergy awareness. I never realized how much they change everyday living. Dairy and eggs are in so many of the foods that we eat! I am just glad that we know what Holly is officially allergic to, and I just hope that she doesn't develop additional allergies. Nor has any reactions to milk or eggs anytime soon. I think eggs and milk are enough to worry about! At least little Holly doesn't know what she is missing out on.
So that is my recent life in a nutshell. Food allergies is definitely a worrisome adventure that I never thought I would have to deal with. But now that I am, I feel like I am prepared to deal with it. And now that I have not had dairy products for over 7 months now, I feel like I could without them for quite a bit longer. I've gotten use to it's absence.
Bye for now! I'll try to post more enteries soon!
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| Holly's rosy cheeks and bigger looking lips a day after her bad milk reaction. Poor Baby she was not a happy camper the following days! |
Poor Holly :( And poor Mommy! My sister cut out all sorts of things the first 4 months or so of breastfeeding, and I could tell it was really hard on her :( I couldn't do it!
ReplyDeleteI hope Holly does grow out of it - it can't be easy having to avoid so much stuff for life!