Reintroducing dairy (to me), what should I look for?

[chlobo]

When my dd was born she was very gassy and always seemed uncomfortable. My now ex-pediatrician suggested that I give up dairy and see if that made any difference in her gassiness.

My husband and I have long suspected that my dairy abstinence has had no affect on her gassiness. In fact, we think we saw a bigger improvement when I gave up on coffee.

DD is now 4 months old and I would like to try re-introducing dairy into my diet and I'd like some advice on how to do so. Do I just drink a glass of milk and monitor dd over the next day or two? What symptoms should I look for in dd that would indicate a milk protein allergy? Is milk the best thing to experiment with? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Irritability and more frequent waking at night would be signs to look for, I think. Also, you might try yogurt first, since a lot of people who can't tolerate drinking milk can eat yogurt with no problems. My other suggestion is to try to reintroduce dairy when as little else is changing as possible (not traveling, teething, trying new foods, on any new medications or going off them, moving, getting immunizations, etc.). I know from personal experience that it's very hard to run a "controlled experiment," but the more you can keep constant, the better chance you have of telling whether dairy is the culprit. If she does seem to feel worse and you go off dairy again, keep in mind that it can take 2 weeks for all the milk proteins to clear your system. BTW, I reintroduced dairy at around the same age and did not notice any big difference in how DS slept (or anything else). I hope you can add those foods back in - ice cream season approaches! :)

Elizabeth, Mom to James, 9-20-02

I've been off dairy since DS was about 3 wks old. Whenever I cheat and have a slice of cheese, DS is fussy, spits up, and gets an eczema rash on his face (and so do I incidentally!).

I've read that eczema is often tied to dairy sensitivity. It's really unpleasant, and the little ones are too uncoordinated to itch at it...

Good luck! Enjoy adding dairy back!
-Sarah
Mom to Dylan, 8/18/03

:) Motherhood is such a joy! :)

I went through the same thing.
My sugestion would be to have some dairy for breakfast and then watch him through the day and night. Keep a record of everything so you can look back at it and figure things out.
I would go slowly and see how it goes.
Also keep in mind the dairy sensitivity when you introduce solids. My son is 9 mos now and we do yogurt but no other dairy. I'm trying to keep those out for as long as possible.

Good luck!
Betsey
Buddy's Mamma 6-10-2003

[chlobo]

Thanks for the advice. She's getting shots on thursday. How long after that should I wait to keepit a "controlled experiment"?

It depends on which shots she is getting. For one of them, for example, it's fairly common to get a fever a week later. I'd ask the ped's office what timeframe to expect for the common reactions. If it's not one of the ones that has the week lag, I would probably wait around 5 days.

Elizabeth, Mom to James, 9-20-02