Going Dairy-Free with a Toddler

When Samuel was born one of the first things the nurse said to me was "Oh!  He's tongue-tied!"  which meant nothing at all to a morphine-addled mama until it was explained to me that through the crazy genetics of one side of our family my son's tongue had developed attached to the bottom of his mouth.  He could move the sides, and to a certain extent the tip, but he couldn't stick it out.  My main concern was 'can he still nurse', which he quickly proved was high on his own personal list of priorities (where it has stayed now for, oh, 19 months.  Sigh) and once that was handled I wondered if he would have speech problems, which a quick trip to a speech therapist told me was unlikely, and even if it happened, could be remedied.

So when Samuel started projectile vomiting, we assumed it had something to do with his air intake while he nursed because of the tongue tie.  We brought him to the doctor, twice, and both times were assured that he was not 'projectile vomiting', just throwing up violently for more than a foot (which is different, apparently) and not to worry.  Our lives revolved around his feedings.  Everything in our house was covered in sheets.  I had to punp before feeding so he didn't get too much milk too quickly, and then feed him the pumped milk by bottle once he was done.  It was time consuming, but we had been told not to worry, so we tried not to.

At around six months we started to offer him food, but he was adament that solids were NOT on the agenda.  I wrote a post a while back about the difficulties of getting the Public Health nurse to understand that we weren't starving our child.  Samuel would nurse, and that was pretty much it, until about 11 months, when I really started to 'push' solids for fear he wasn't getting enough nutrition.

Both of these factors, his vomiting and reluctance to eat solids, as well as the vomiting that came after he ate solids, didn't clue me in to anything specifically wrong, I still assumed it was his tongue tie combined with a touchy tummy and a general stubborn streak.  But his diapers started to worry me.  Although he's 19 months old he has very rarely had a solid poop, what I would consider a 'grown-up poop'.  His bowel movements are filled with partially digested food, smell awful, and are liquid.  And he's sick a LOT.  He has been on antibiotics probably 10 times in his short life, in and out of the hospital emerg. room, back and forth to the doctor over and over again.  His nose is always runny, he's always coughing and phlemy, he's got a constant diaper rash that runs the scale from 'mild pinkness' to 'red and bleeding skin.'  He's got eczema on his legs.

I tried all the diaper creams, switched him from cloth to disposables, bathed him more frequently, then less frequently, then without soap, then with anti-itch soap...I kept him hydrated, then I tried less fibre and fruit, then pre-mashing his food so it would digest better...I tried so many things, but nothing has seemed to work.

Last week I told David "I think perhaps this is indicative of something bigger.  Maybe a food sensitivity"  And David agreed that an elimination diet was the way to go, and since I'm still nursing, that means a diet for Sam and mama.  And so here we are, day one of no diary.

I chose to start with milk products because of a few factors.  First off, I know people who have children with dairy sensitivities, and some of the symptoms sounded similar.  Secondly, dairy is fairly recognizeable (although I learned from my first dairy-free grocery store visit yesterday, it is hidden in a lot of foods).  Thirdly, it's a common sensitivity, so the chance that dairy is the issue is greater.  And finally, we eat a lot of dairy, so he would have had it frequently enough for it to provide this length and extent of reaction.  Peanuts, for example, we eat very infrequently, so cutting those out would be pointless.

Anyway, I'll do my best to keep up a post every once in a while about our new milk-free lifestyle.  I have NO IDEA what to make for meals, now.