Breastfeeding And Elimination Trials

[Guhlia]

Hi everyone! I'm still breastfeeding my daughter, Annika. She has a horrible rash all over her body and my doctor suggested food allergies. It almost looks as though she has cigarette burns on parts of her body, that's how bad the rash is. I'm willing to try almost anything to get rid of it. Obviously, I'm gluten free already, but I'd like to start elimination trials to see if I can get her skin to clear up. Where should I start? I only want to eliminate one thing at a time since I'm already having a hard time with getting enough calories/nutrients. I started with tomato because I had recently made spaghetti, lasagna, and stuffed shells right around the time the rash first showed up. I thought maybe tomato was the culprit, but after 3 days 100% tomato free I'm not really seeing any improvement. I'm going to give each food one week. I know dairy/soy/eggs are high up on the list to try, but I was hoping for some suggestions for other things I might try if those don't work.

[Fiddle-Faddle]

My middle child had this. In his case, it was somehow triggered by vaccines (started 24 hours after his 2-month shots). It lasted 8 months, and for 1 of those, I was gluten-free and cf, and it didn't seem to make any difference to his rash.

By the time he was a year old, all that was left of his rash was concentrated on his inner elbows, and when I went gluten-free two years ago, suddenly his rash (the doctor said at that point that it was blistering eczema) suddenly went away. We did 2 challenges, and both times, when he ate gluten, the rash came back.

So he is now mostly gluten-free (hubby keeps buying him Rice Krispie Treats ), and we are going VERY slowly with vaccines--only one at a time, and we are skipping several (chicken pox, Hepatitis B, flu, etc.).

You have probably already researched vaccines, as there is so much on this board about them!

I'm also wondering about mercury toxicity--maybe if you have dental amalgams (the metal cavity fillings, most of us have them ) , maybe they are leaching mercury into your milk???

For diet, strawberries, citrus, and peanuts/nuts are all also high up on the allergy list.

[Fiddle-Faddle]

Forgot to mention--it could also be a contact dermatitis type thing. Soaps, laundry detergent, bleach, and especially fabric softener could be a factor here.

[Guhlia]

I use All free and clear laundry detergent and I don't generally use fabric softener. I do wear body spray and I guess maybe that will be the next thing I nix after I'm done with the tomato thing. It could just be SO many things! Funny, I think it may have started after her vaccinations last month. I really can't be sure though. Does anyone know what vaccines they get at 3 months? I'm right that they get vaccinated then, right?

Does citric acid count as citrus? I know that's probably a dumb question, but I really have no idea.

I don't eat strawberries and I don't generally eat nuts, though I will on occasion.

The rash is relatively red, raised bumps that look like they're going to come to a head, but never really do. Some almost look like a semi-healed cigarette burn. Others are just 1x2 or so patches of these little bumps. They're very dry and VERY bright pink. Plus, in addition to this rash her scalp seems to be oozing (she has horrible cradle cap). We're taking her to the doctor tomorrow for her checkup and I'll be sure to talk to her about all of my concerns. She was actually the one who suggested it may be food allergies. I'm actually hoping maybe its a fungal infection or something that we'll be able to treat easily.

Ugh... I swear I'm going to be completely gray before this baby turns 1.

[happygirl]

Citric acid can be derived from citrus or from corn.

[Fiddle-Faddle]

My middle child (the one who had the rash) also had HORRIBLE cradle cap. I found that the best thing to do for it was--NOTHING. It didn't seem to bother him any.

It didn't go away for at least a year, but I'm pretty sure it didn't do him any harm. I was afraid that all those chemicals that they suggest for cradle cap WOULD end up doing harm, so I didn't use any. We did see one pediatrician (we go to a group practice, and try to see this one as we like him best) who said it was FINE to do nothing for the cradle cap ( and his subspecialty was dermatology).

Each pediatrician has their own vaccine schedule. It kind of depends on when you bring the baby in for the well-child check-up, but almost every infant well-child visit is for shots.

I have heard of pediatricians who give flu shots with the other multiple vaccines without discussing it with the parents--they just give them a sheaf of papers to sign (which the nurse brings in right when your child starts screaming, and the nurse chirps cheerfully, "Time for our shots! Mom, I need you to sign these, please!").

I wonder if The Rash (your child's and mine) is linked with some kind of vaccine/gluten intolerance/celiac connection?

[dandelionmom]

All 3 of my girls get eczema that sounds like it presents just like the rash you described. We only bathe every other day and use very gentle soap only sparingly (even the baby washes and shampoos are pretty harsh for sensitive skin). As soon as they're out of the tub, I cover them with Eucerin lotion and put Aquaphor on any of the rashy spots.

My eldest flares up from almonds, berries, and chocolate.

My middle daughter flares up when she's been glutened.

The baby flares up from soy.

It sounds like you've got a good idea of what to eliminate. Good luck! Hope she feels better soon!

My pediatrician described cradle cap as another manifestation of eczema. She advised shampooing the hair with the soft infant hair brush, really brush it in well, let the shampoo sit for a minute and then rinse well.

[vanillazeis]

Hi everyone! I'm still breastfeeding my daughter, Annika. She has a horrible rash all over her body and my doctor suggested food allergies. It almost looks as though she has cigarette burns on parts of her body, that's how bad the rash is. I'm willing to try almost anything to get rid of it. Obviously, I'm gluten free already, but I'd like to start elimination trials to see if I can get her skin to clear up. Where should I start? I only want to eliminate one thing at a time since I'm already having a hard time with getting enough calories/nutrients. I started with tomato because I had recently made spaghetti, lasagna, and stuffed shells right around the time the rash first showed up. I thought maybe tomato was the culprit, but after 3 days 100% tomato free I'm not really seeing any improvement. I'm going to give each food one week. I know dairy/soy/eggs are high up on the list to try, but I was hoping for some suggestions for other things I might try if those don't work.

So the top 8 allergens are milk, soy, and egg (as you said), wheat, peanut, treenut, fish and shellfish. As i understand it corn is super common and just barely missed making the top eight. I would start with milk, i dont know how old your daughter is, but milk is the number one food allergy in kids under 1, and it is the most common for babies to react to through breastmilk. 50% of kids with a milk allergy are also allergic to soy, so those two might run together. I would go ahead and cut out peanuts, treenuts, fish and shellfish, because they are the easiest to avoid, and known for the worst reactions. If you have a kiddo that is allergic to something than you dont want your kids exposed to those 4 allergens until they are atleast 3 years old (im choosing to wait until 5 with my kids) Your on the right track! if you cant figure it out you might have to work backwards on this, and cut back to a few basic foods, rice, chicken, carrots, potatoes and then slowly add things back in. You could be dealing with multiple food allergies. My kiddo was allergic to 13 foods when she was younger, so eliminating one at a time wouldnt have worked for us. Good luck, i hope you figure this out soon!

[crittermom]

I breastfed my ds for 2 years on a very strict diet. He had infant reflux until 22 months. I began a food diary in the beginning and recorded everything I ate, his reactions, night wakings, refluxing, and bowel movements. I too thought in the beginning that tomato was the culprit and it was the same, spaghetti one night, lasagna then next and pizza on another. I then ate mexican which had no tomato but the flair up happened again..... CHEESE!!!! I finally had the "AHA" moment, the common denomenator was cheese! So I cut out the dairy and voila, everything was fine. As soon as I got a little dairy again, watch out, everything flared up again. I would suggest starting with the dairy. Also I would say try a diary to keep track, it will show you patterns you may not have picked up! Good luck and good for you sticking to the BF. I know it can be difficult especially when you have to start eliminating things! Take care, good luck, and let us know how it is going.

Oh btw, Michael also had terrible cradle cap, I used regular ol' baby oil and a very soft bristled baby brush. I would put the oil on let it sit for a couple minutes "brush" his hair gently and then wash it out. Some of the crust would come off. Cradle cap is basically when new skin cells form faster than the old ones therefore pushing the old ones up before they are ready to flake off. (at least that's what I read at the time) Michael grew out of his around 6 or 7 months. While it was not pretty it didn't seem to bother him at all. His hair would just get caught up in the crust, that's why I did the oil thing. And I have friend with a son with exzema. She does that same as a previous post, wash every other day and immediately out of the tub, no drying, just lubes him up with Eucerin and Aquaphor. It really helps in the winter.

[shan]

is there no way you can do a conventional allergy test, where your baby doesnt have to be eating what you are testing for? I think the conventional test is called RAST testing and apparently is pretty accurate, till the age of 5, and after that there can be falses... It is hell on earth elliminating food while you are feeding

[Guhlia]

I had Annika to the doctor today and she told me to cut out everything but meat, veggies, and fruits. She's also sending her to a dermotologist. So... Tomorrow I will go everything free and see how that goes. She said there's a possibility with as bad as the rash is that its fungal or viral. We will know that after our derm appt hopefully. Wish us luck! I am SOOOOOOOOO bad about eliminating things. I really hope I can do this for her. I really, really, really don't want to fail and have to resort to some kind of high dollar formula.

[vanillazeis]

I had Annika to the doctor today and she told me to cut out everything but meat, veggies, and fruits. She's also sending her to a dermotologist. So... Tomorrow I will go everything free and see how that goes. She said there's a possibility with as bad as the rash is that its fungal or viral. We will know that after our derm appt hopefully. Wish us luck! I am SOOOOOOOOO bad about eliminating things. I really hope I can do this for her. I really, really, really don't want to fail and have to resort to some kind of high dollar formula.

Oh I am so sorry. That's what i had to do with Bayleigh, and it sucked, but you'll start adding things back in pretty quickly, and you'll be able to figure it out! Bayleigh was also allergic to pork, chicken, rice, potato, apple. lemon and banana, so we had to do alot of taking out and putting other things in to figure it out.

I recently had to start giving my almost 12 month old formula (i stopped making milk, im pregnant with number three), and he only reacted to green beans through my breastmilk, but he is reacting to all formula. He has terrible exzema, diaper rash, hives, vomiting, etc. from hypoallergenic formula, and it costs a ton! Stick with breastfeeding as long as possible. You can't eliminate even one ingredient from hypoallergenic formula

[canadiandream]

I did an elimination diet when I was breastfeeding my 2.5 month old baby - she had suddenly developed all sorts of allergy symptoms. I was desperate, as it wasn't just the rash, but the screaming, constipation and gas. In the end I found she reacted when I had cow's milk, eggs, gluten (I'm not celiac, but she might be), corn, bananas, dates, coconut, soy. This has gotten better over the months (she's 12 months old now) and corn, soy and cow's cheese are OK in my diet - but maybe this is because we breastfeed so much less now?

Babies can have intolerances or allergies to any food, and traces of all foods you eat end up in your breastmilk (giving it the flavours of your diet as well) - if you have a very sensitive baby, even cow's milk in your cup of tea could set her off.

I found that most foods took 4-7 days to wear off, but gluten took more like 2 weeks, so you might need to be patient with your experiments. It was a really tough time when I eliminated so many food groups from my diet (I lost all the pregnancy weight!) but it paid off to make my baby well again. I found potato chips and french fries were a great way of getting calories (but no good if bella donna family foods are the problem).

Good luck!

[Guhlia]

For those of you who have done this, how on earth did you eat enough to not pass out? I ate what felt like an INSANE amount of food today and was so hungry and weak that I couldn't even get the dishes done or make dinner. I ended up getting a ridiculous migraine and had to temporarily stop breastfeeding (she's getting pre-pumped milk) so that I could take Imitrex. I am now enjoying a bagel with cream cheese and finally starting to not feel so dizzy. This diet is WAY harder than I would have thought it would be. HELP!

I need easy meal ideas, tasty snack ideas, and the most filling foods you can think of. Last night for dinner I ate half a chicken breast, baked potato with coconut oil, and brocolli. I ate huge portions and cleared my plate and I was starving within 20 minutes. I then had an apple and was still starving. It was like I just couldn't fill myself up.

[thepeach80]

Open Original Shared Link

That's the diet I would reccomend. All of my kids have been at LEAST milk, soy, and egg, Evan ended up intolerant to about everything and I decided to wean him to Neocate at 12 mos. Ilana is still on Neocate and you can see her list of things we're avoiding below. W/ the diet, you HAVE to have LOTS of oil! That's your source of fat and you have to take it in or you will feel hungry and will lose too much weight and be undernourished and no good to anyone. There's no reason to keep bfing if you're not healthy. My diet w/ Evan consisted of turkey, carrots, pears, rice, salt, pepper, canola oil, and sucanat. Of course you can use rice pasta and crackers too as those are only rice, and rice cakes. I had to change my TED based on what we already knew Evan reacted to. Here's some ideas.

Meals:

hasbrowns mixed with ground turkey

rice mixed with ground turkey and oil and veggie

Rice pasta with or without ground turkey and oil

Turkey breast with baked potatoes and oil

Turkey cutlet and rice "stir fry"

Boiled potatoes with sea salt and oil

sliced potatoes baked with oil and sea salt

baked potato wedge fries

Rice, squash (or veggie) mixed with turkey breast chunks

Whole turkey (I heard if you cook in renyolds oven bag you should get enough drippings for gravy) served with mashed potatoes

Ground turkey burgers (using rice to hold it together)

Potato pancakes (grated potato w/mashed to hold and fry in safe oil)

Dessert: (see recipe for below)

rice cakes with sweet potato spread

sweet potato cookies

sugar cookie

rice with oil and sugar (yes it is yummy)

pears w/ pear juice and ice cubes in blender

Recommended brands/types:

Rice oil: California Rice Oil

Rice Flour - Bob's Red Mill (potential for x-contam)

Rice Pasta - Tinkyada

Rice Cakes - Lundberg Farms plain brown rice

Rice Milk - 365 Whole Foods (plain only, vanilla flavor contains corn. Rice Milk is risky but if using this is safest as far as ingredients go.)

salt - sea salt (iodonized contains dextrose)

sugar - 100% sugar, evaporated cane juice crystals, not one w/added corn-based ingredients, not regular sugar: Florida Crystals, Sucanat

[Fiddle-Faddle]

For those of you who have done this, how on earth did you eat enough to not pass out? I ate what felt like an INSANE amount of food today and was so hungry and weak that I couldn't even get the dishes done or make dinner.

I felt like this (migraines and all) whenever my babies were going through growth spurts--they would be nursing a ton, I would eat and eat and drink and drink, and still feel like I was starving. Something about the increase in feedings changed hormone balances for me, too, and triggered migraines. And I wasn't even doing an elimination diets.

Sorry I can't think of anything helpful, but {{{hugs}}}. Maybe lots of brown rice would be filling?

[Guhlia]

I've reluctantly added rice back in to get something filling in my diet.

Oddly though, within hours after starting the diet her rash appeared better. Last night when she had to go on pumped milk her rash didn't get any worse. I think perhaps she was just having a reaction to my body spray which I stopped using 2.5 days ago. I will give the diet a few more days until the rash is gone, but I'm feeling hopeful that it was just a contact reaction from my Bath and Body Works stuff.

How often am I supposed to add foods back in once her rash is gone? Can I add two foods at a time to speed things up? I know I might have to eliminate both again if she has a reaction, but I'm really struggling here. Should I test the body spray theory by rubbing a little on her? If she reacts to that should I stop with the elimination diet?

[canadiandream]

I was too keen to add foods back into my diet, and totally regretted it. I'd have these days where things seemed to be going OK, so what the hell, I'd try two new foods together. My baby would have a reaction, and I wouldn't know which food it was. Then I'd have to wait another week of avoiding both new foods (and all the old foods, as I wouldn't know if they'd cause a reaction, because baby would be freaking out already) before my little one was OK again, and I could move onto trying the foods seperately.

I know it's so tempting to eat stuff, but a little more patience (you've been so good already!) and hopefully soon you'll know if there's a food that disagrees with your baby. If it *is* just your body spray you'll have nothing to worry about, and you'll be able to introduce a second food soon.

I used to eat millet with butternut squash and mackerel (I know: fish - but it seemed to be OK for us) with oil dressing quite often - lots of calories and nutrients and things.

[mama2two]

It can take two weeks after eliminating an allergen to see results, so you may want to give it more time than just one week.

[Pattymom]

For those of you who have done this, how on earth did you eat enough to not pass out? I ate what felt like an INSANE amount of food today and was so hungry and weak that I couldn't even get the dishes done or make dinner. I ended up getting a ridiculous migraine and had to temporarily stop breastfeeding (she's getting pre-pumped milk) so that I could take Imitrex. I am now enjoying a bagel with cream cheese and finally starting to not feel so dizzy. This diet is WAY harder than I would have thought it would be. HELP!

I need easy meal ideas, tasty snack ideas, and the most filling foods you can think of. Last night for dinner I ate half a chicken breast, baked potato with coconut oil, and brocolli. I ate huge portions and cleared my plate and I was starving within 20 minutes. I then had an apple and was still starving. It was like I just couldn't fill myself up.

[Pattymom]

My youngest, now 3, was allergic to lots of things as an infant and had rashes all over. We did use the ucerin and aquafor, but I also stopped eating milk, soy, gluten, eggs, and all nuts. So I ate basically meat, fruits and veg. rice and potatoes. I ate constantly, as there isnt' a lot of calories is the above. Lots of snacks or corn chips with bean dip, or taco seasoned meat. I also ate hummus. As much protein all the time so I wasnt' so hungry. Rice milk and fruit smoothies were good too. Breakfast was usually left over dinner. Chinese food was usually pretty safe, if you hold the sauces. I think my family was so sick of meat by the end of it all. By the end of the first year, we added back eggs and some nuts. by age two everything but the gluten was OK, except limited dairy--only cheese and yogurt because the proteins are broken down some already. I called it my adventure if food free living. I did have a good waffle recipe. I ate waffles with unsweetened jam all day long. They were made form rice flour, rice milk, egg substitute, etc. virtual food. I think what kept me going was the reality that if she couldn't tolerate breastmilk even with a few allergins, there isnt' a formula around that would do a better a job, and she would miss all the antibodies of breastmilk that she seemed to really need. My mantra was that I could suffer for a few months so she could have the life long benefits of breastmilk. I did indulge my self with little presents and long baths to try to keep it all together. We did live thorugh it. OH, we also did have yeast and fungal issues, so I didn't eat any processed sugar either. The most useful cookbooks were from Carol Fenster. Special Diet Solutions.

The research suggest that it takes at least 2 weeks off dairy and most allergins to have it out of your body completely. and sometimes the symptoms flair up worse after the first week.

Good luck.