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Infant Reflux (gerd) And Celiac?

mom2two

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mom2two Apprentice
mom2two
Posted

I have a 3.5 month little boy who was born almost 2 months early. He has severe reflux and is on multiple meds, sleeps in a wedge, and coughs and chokes often. I was wondering if this is common in babies who may have celiac? His sister (7) has celiac and his paternal Grandmother. I do not have celiac and do not eat gluten free and do exclusively nurse. I know the info. is mixed as to whether gluten crosses into breastmilk so I didn't know if going gluten free was worth it. I tried when he was in the NICU but couldn't maintain it. Any rec?

Thanks so much,

Kristen

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nasalady Contributor
nasalady
Posted
I have a 3.5 month little boy who was born almost 2 months early. He has severe reflux and is on multiple meds, sleeps in a wedge, and coughs and chokes often. I was wondering if this is common in babies who may have celiac? His sister (7) has celiac and his paternal Grandmother. I do not have celiac and do not eat gluten free and do exclusively nurse. I know the info. is mixed as to whether gluten crosses into breastmilk so I didn't know if going gluten free was worth it. I tried when he was in the NICU but couldn't maintain it. Any rec?

Thanks so much,

Kristen

Hi Kristen,

Yes, both of my granddaughters have celiac disease/gluten intolerance. Carly, the eldest, was diagnosed via biopsy with celiac disease and she has had severe GERD her entire life. Emma had negative bloodwork and has not had a biopsy, but is HLA DQ2 and has a diagnosis of Failure to Thrive....she also has GERD, although not quite as bad as Carly's.

I have GERD too....and celiac disease. My GERD is worse right now because I'm on prednisone for autoimmune hepatitis.

Some of the nursing mothers on this forum have said that when they went gluten free they noticed a difference in their child's symptoms. Did you notice whether or not your efforts at eating gluten free helped your baby while he was in the NICU? If it helps him at all, the gluten free diet is TOTALLY worth it.

There are many recipes and helpful tips on the gluten free lifestyle on this board, if you decide to try again. It's not as difficult as you might think.

Good luck!

JoAnn

shayesmom Rookie
shayesmom
Posted
I have a 3.5 month little boy who was born almost 2 months early. He has severe reflux and is on multiple meds, sleeps in a wedge, and coughs and chokes often. I was wondering if this is common in babies who may have celiac? His sister (7) has celiac and his paternal Grandmother. I do not have celiac and do not eat gluten free and do exclusively nurse. I know the info. is mixed as to whether gluten crosses into breastmilk so I didn't know if going gluten free was worth it. I tried when he was in the NICU but couldn't maintain it. Any rec?

Thanks so much,

Kristen

The only recommendation I would make is to suggest you find a way to maintain a gluten-free diet long enough to tell if it helps your son. You can also have him tested for food allergies at this age via CAPRAST. GERD is often a symptom of food allergies or Celiac. And since the tests can be unreliable, dietary response is the best indicator.

Darn210 Enthusiast
Darn210
Posted
I have a 3.5 month little boy who was born almost 2 months early. He has severe reflux and is on multiple meds, sleeps in a wedge, and coughs and chokes often. I was wondering if this is common in babies who may have celiac? His sister (7) has celiac and his paternal Grandmother. I do not have celiac and do not eat gluten free and do exclusively nurse. I know the info. is mixed as to whether gluten crosses into breastmilk so I didn't know if going gluten free was worth it. I tried when he was in the NICU but couldn't maintain it. Any rec?

Thanks so much,

Kristen

With a history in the family, it's a possibility but reflux is quite common in premature babies. My friends daughter was born at 31 weeks. Everytime they fed her (bottle fed) they had to keep her upright for the next 30 minutes or everything just came right back out. Not so bad during the day, but not a lot of fun at 2am. The doctors told them it would last about a year (that's how long it would take to strengthen the undeveloped muscles) and she was surprised how close their estimate was . . . and she said it was like a switch . . . she had it, then she didn't.

A trial diet would answer the question for you.

jmjsmomma Apprentice
jmjsmomma
Posted

My 5yo celiac had horrid GERD as an infant. He was full term, healthy weight, and within 4 weeks of being home he had it bad.

mommida Enthusiast
mommida
Posted

Get to a Ped. Gastro. If it is GERD, medication can help. If it is some other problem, only a specialist will be able to make the diagnoses. If it is Celiac it is your best chance for getting a diagnoses, at this age it is a difficult diagnoses. Blood tests for Celiac aren't very accurate in a patient under 24 months, and a baby's immune system is supposed to kick in around 5 months. You should know, that an endoscopy with biopsy is pretty standard part of testing for these type symptoms.

swalker Newbie
swalker
Posted

We found out after the fact that my grandson's extreme colic was caused by his exclusively nursing Mom eating gluten and dairy, so a trial removal couldn't hurt.

I would also suggest looking at www.blyum.com in case there are physical reasons for the choking resulting from his prematurity. The sooner you start, if that is the case, the better and quicker the results.

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The Kids Folks Apprentice
The Kids Folks
Posted

Our daughter had gerd and reflux early on. She was pretty much an urpie/pukie baby. By the time she was two, she was put on prevacid for her GERD. In the morning she often reminded us of a cat trying to rid itself of a hairball (sorry for the icky description, but that's truly what it reminded us of!). Any way our house went gluten-free in October b/c of her brother and his slow growth and chronic C, well guess what, once she went gluten-free no more GERD or reflux. And now no more medications!! Hard to believe since she was medicated for 2 years and still had symptoms with the medications.

Bad behaviors also went away - 20/20 hindsight the behaviors were caused by her feeling icky all the time. Some days she would hardly eat b/c of the reflux, other days she would only eat one type of food b/c it didn't make her feel icky!

She has been totally gluten-free since January and is doing great! Quite the happy kiddo if she avoids gluten.

If you don't do a trial now, you might want to keep it in mind as your child grows! It made a huge difference in our house! :)

The Kids Folks

Christine E Newbie
Christine E
Posted

My son supposedly had GERD his whole first year, on meds, Neocate formula. When he started losing weight at a year, a different ped GI did the biopsy and blood work, both of which were negative. The biopsy showed slight changes, but he did test positive for the gene marker. The diet worked. He has never had a positive blood test. I would assume the gluten and dairy are being transferred through breast milk and eliminate them from your diet, maybe one at a time to see if they make a difference. My son slept in his bouncy seat for 6 months, and never slept more than 3 hours till 15 months, after he had been gluten-free for 5 weeks. :)

bear6954 Apprentice
bear6954
Posted

My son is now 3. He was diagnosed with celiac via biopsy at age 2. At that time, I told his GI dr that I was still nursing him down to sleep. He told me that gluten does not pass into breastmilk. Fast forward 1 yr. We go in for my sons 1 yr gluten free check up. My son has been 100% gluten free for 1 yr. (This occurred in Feb). My sons liver was 13 cm long (as big as a full grown adult), lactose intolerant, too much sugar or fat gave him the bid D, he never got his 2 yr molars, grew 5 ", but only gained 1 pound, acid reflux - sitting up and throwing up in bed or throwing up when playing, still failure to thrive, short stature, and non fasting hypoglycemia. My sons gi dr was trying to tell me that my son has some rare genetic disease. I did lots of research on my sons symptoms. Basically, I figured my son was getting gluten threw my breastmilk and as a result his celiac symptoms were less severe than when he ate gluten (he has classic celiac symptoms when he eats it). I went gluten free about 3 weeks ago. I also started my son on Neocate Jr and started testing his blood sugars. Within 1 week of me being gluten-free and my son on the Neocate Jr, he began to get his 2 yr molars. He also grew 1 1/4" and gained 1 pound. My son is on Prevacid and it has done wonders for the acid reflux. I am a firm believer that gluten passes into breastmilk. His liver has gotten much smaller and he no longer has hypoglycemia. My sons GI dr now believes that gluten does pass into breastmilk.

I was also looking at pic of my son at 4 and 6 months. He was a chubby baby, but his belly was huge compared to kids his age. I also remember giving my son mixed infant cereal and noticing it gave him really messy poops. I just figured his belly was not ready for that and quit feeding it to him.

My son also had acid reflux since birth.

Now I look back and figure that my son had celiacs at birth. I nursed my son since day one and ate wheat. I am sure that my breastmilk made all of his symptoms worse and I wish I could turn back time and fix that for him.

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