What Do I Need To Do?

[Jen2]

My youngest daughter is 13 months old. Here is her story - please help me advocate for her and get her healthy again!

At 2 weeks old she started having bad colic, when I took dairy out of my diet, she improved some but not much. Her Dr. diagnosed her with reflux, put her on meds, ended up on super strong meds, and that helped the colic. BUT she didn't gain weight.

By 3 months old she had fallen off of the growth chart and I opted to try a "gentle" formula instead of failure to thrive testing because they couldn't get blood and boy was that torturous.

At 6 months old her symptoms started coming back when she started on solids, but it coincided with teething so I didn't realize it was food related.

At 9 months we all went gluten free and we saw a huge improvement in her - her diapers started being more solid, still soft but not pure diarrhea and she started sleeping through the night.

At 10 months her dr. told us to switch to milk instead of the "gentle" formula b/c she wasn't drinking enough formula, and her symptoms started returning. Her poops were all diarrhea, always yellow, with undigested food. Her bottom was covered in raw, open sores. We also discovered that she cannot tolerate synthetic citric acid.

At 11 months I got a referral to an allergist, because the ped. wanted her tested for celiac's. Allergist told me he suspected celiac's too but it was useless to test her because she was gluten free and I am NOT willing to do a gluten trial. He told me to keep a food diary (which I was).

At 12 months I took her off of all dairy, hard core. I went to an herbalist who suspected dairy and gave me an herbal tea to help her gut heal. Her ped. approved the tea. We discovered an allergy to bananas (no swelling or hives, but she gets a cough, runny nose and major intestinal distention/gas/upset tummy)

At first, on the dairy free/gluten free diet, she did better, with no major colic episodes, diapers starting to slow down.

Over the past week, though, I am seeing her symptoms slowly coming back - waking up at night fussy, more and more gassy during the day, diarrhea diapers increasing again, the skin on her bottom burning from the poop again. We are 3 weeks dairy free - she is drinking almond milk.

I don't know what to do now - all I know is that I know my baby's not healthy and I need to get her gut functioning properly again.

[pricklypear1971]

Salicylates, histamines, amines.

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Search around this site for info. Some people here have a lot of experience.

She sounds like she has a problem with dairy, and gluten, but almonds are high in salicylates. Bananas are low sal but that may be an allergy - does she react to latex? They say that's linked to bananas.

What class does synthetic citric acid belong to? You may need to avoid that whole class/group.

[Jen2]

synthetic citric acid is a mold based "thing" (can it be called a food??)

I am going to see what else is in the class of cross-reactivity with banana and I am going to call in the morning to get allergy testing to rule that aspect out.

Thanks for the research tips, and regarding latex, I have no idea, but I will keep an eye out for it.

[squirmingitch]

What about soy? Have you eliminated that?

[pricklypear1971]

She may also be suffering from "leaky gut" - meaning she's going to react to almost anything, unfortunately.

You may try probiotics and digestive enzymes and see if it helps. Make sure tgey are dairy and gluten free. I use Enzymedica Digest Gold and megaflora probiotics.

You may also look into a gut building diet like GAPS.

[Jen2]

Yeah, I am concerned about leaky gut... I'll look into digestive enzymes too. She's just so young to already have so many digestive problems, it breaks my heart!

[pricklypear1971]

Yeah, I am concerned about leaky gut... I'll look into digestive enzymes too. She's just so young to already have so many digestive problems, it breaks my heart!

I know. I understand. Been there to a lesser degree (my son couldn't do milk or soy at birth - so I had no milk or soy during bf'ing). Now it's looking like he still has a mill issue and perhaps gluten. Sigh.

[Jen2]

Well, I got an allergist appointment for actual testing on Tuesday and then an appointment with a ped. GI specialist for next Friday.

Hopefully the combination of the two will start us down the path towards healing. We had a bad night last night - I fixed red beans and rice (with corn) for dinner and she loved it but by 11pm, she was up, having a lot of high gas gurgles in her tummy, crying inconsolably in waves. Colic calm is how I usually treat the episodes but I had to use two doses over an hour to get any change at all. She finally went back to sleep sometime after midnight. I guess I will add beans to the list of things to avoid for now.

[pricklypear1971]

Beans could be causing her trouble, or corn. Corn is a more frequent offender around here.

Sorry she had such a hard night. Digestive enzymes might help her digest some foods and break them down for her intestine if it's an intolerance. Take them when she starts eating or just before.