Allergic to Dairy

My 2 year old is allergic to dairy, wheat, soy, eggs and peanuts, so we've been very limited in what we can feed her. As far as snacks go, there's a brand called "Enjoy Life" which you can find at Whole Foods and Gluten-Free specialty stores (there's one called Delicious-N-Fit in Plano). My daughter loves the cookies and bars - especially the Snickerdoodle cookies. They're free of dairy and all the other items she's allergic to.

Good luck!

Hi J.,
Did you just describe my dilemma too?? No, but my son is milk intolerant-he came back negative on the allergy test, but gets diaper rash so bad if he drinks it that he gets blisters-within hours of drinking it. How old is your son? Mine is 15.5. mo. At 11 months he even had the reaction to yogurt. Now, at 15 months he can tolerate small amounts of yogurt and cheese (he doesn't like much in the way of cheese) or other products with trace milk amounts in them. Did you nurse? I did, and I had to do no milk/no soy. It was so hard, and I finally gave up at 10.5 months and we did nestle formula. He would not ever take Neocate as was suggested. We flavored it, and waited 24 hours and he went 24 hrs without drinking. Since the goodstart agreed with him, the GI presumes it's the casein that bothers him.

As far as your soy question, we had the same reaction when I tried soy milk and yogurt at 13 mo.

We now do rice milk mixed with a little yogurt (he won't touch rice milk otherwise) twice a day and I give him flinstones bone support (1/2 tab once a day). It was really hard at 12 months when I had to check every label. Have you tried avacado? Another tip--my GI said if you don't have peanut allergies in your family, to try crackers w/just a LITTLE peanut butter on them. The come premade at Target-Market Pantry brand and my son LOVES them. Have you tried green beans at room temp out of a can plain? That's the only veggie my ds will eat. A friend suggested it and sure enough he ate them. For breakfast, I do the gerber cereal bars, which have a teeny bit of milk, but if you want to try those that don't have milk, get the Market Pantry imitation Nutrigrain ones-they don't have milk, but the Nutrigrain ones do, so don't buy those. You could also try toast with preserves.

Feel free to email me if you want to chat more about this. I have done a lot of research and reading on it.

BTW, my son also has reflux. He takes prevacid still and was just weaned off Reglan.

R.

My chld has multiple allergies, including dairy.

Yes, soy is questionable. Many dairy-allergic children are also allergic to soy protein, plus the estrogen issue some others mentioned is something to be wary of. Good for your doctor, looks like the medical field is catching on!

You might try oat milk that's fortified with Vitamin D and calcium, or if your child takes fortified rice milk that's fine too. In my daughter's case we just let her eat other foods with fat, like bacon, etc. after she had some teeth. We were also able to give her goat cheese from Central Market (they have a cheddar style brand called Alta Dena).

Other snacks we feed our daughter are the freeze dried Gerber fruits, we take plain puffed rice cereal and mix them in sometimes. (I had to get creative because she can't even have the wheat in Cheerios!)

If your child won't do the dried fruit, the organic section of the grocery store (Kroger's is good) should have some Earth's Best Sesame Street cookies, etc. that may be dairy-free. There should also be dairy-free foods for adults in the same section, including cookies. Hope this helps.

Oh, and the last and best advice I can share is www.foodyoucaneat.com - you enter the food your family needs to avoid, and get tons of recipes in every category. You'll love it!

Do you know what it is in the milk that he's allergic to? My daughter is allergic to something that's in milk but not in yogurt or cheese, which she loves. I give her soy milk, but there's also almond milk and a couple other options. Do you have a good healthfood store near you where you can go look over some options and maybe talk to someone there?

My daughter had asthma very young and was taken off of milk. She has always loved cheese and because of her diabetes we needed "free" carb foods. I found veggie cheese at Whole Foods - made from veggies not cow's milk...also if memory serves they had cheese made from rice milk as well.....they were a great resource......

Try goat's milk. It's been a godsend here b/c our son reacted to cow's milk and soy milk and it's closer to cow's milk and without some of the risks of soy

I know where you're coming from. I was allergic to cow's milk as a child and to this day still have trouble with, though it's not as severe. While looking through the cook books at my local library, for new ideas, I found some wonderful Dairy-Free Cooking books. I really liked this one - The milk-free kitchen : living well without dairy products By Kidder, Beth.
Although, this one is pretty helpful, too. Dairy-free cookbook : over 250 recipes for people with lactose intolerance or milk allergy By Zukin, Jane. Hope this helps.

Maureen is correct. Soy is not healthy for young children. In too many cases, it does contain estrogen that is especially not needed in young boys.

http://www.veggieboards.com/boards/showthread.php?t=51106

"In baby boys, 12 months of soy feeding can lead to gross effects by the age of 11 or 12. Breasts can appear and testicles do not develop."

Please be careful what "natural" foods you give your children.

Best of luck!!!!

Hi,
Our son was allergic to the protein in milk and we were told that kids allergic to dairy usually develop the same reactions to soy over time. So that's why your doctor may have told you to stay away from it. At one year old, after I stopped nursing we switched him to goats milk since it almost mirrored the vitamins, minerals, fat and calcium in cow's milk. So as far as meals go, anything that calls for milk, I use goat's milk. I've had to cut cheese from our family meals, but I buy it for sandwiches for my other kids. It's better for my hips and waistline anyway.
Our son (22 months now) eats baked chicken, chicken nuggets of course, broccolli & most cooked veggies, spaghetti and meatballs, beef rice-a-roni with ground beef mixed in. For snacks he likes applebutter sandwiches (applebutter found at Kroger, target, tomthumb) is like thick applesauce and you can eat it on bread/toast. He also eats gramham crackers, grapes, dry cereal, pancakes and syrup, etc. There are alot of foods without dairy. Hope that helps. D.

One thing that comes to mind (after all 3 of my kids were on soy - sigh) is that soy is a plant estrogen which may create a body environment that leads to cancers in some women...plus do you want to give your young, growing son estrogen several times a day? Had I known, I wouldn't have.

I'm surprised at how the mainstream still whole heartedly promotes soy as healthy when there is a plethora of studies suggesting otherwise. I'm glad to hear that your doctor said no soy. I guess you have to follow who makes money. Soy is a big idustry.

My husband wants all of us off all dairy but I haven't been able (willing) to do it. He says we will all feel much better.

I may be totally wrong, but it's my two cents for what it's worth.

Hi - My kids are now 18 and 15. I didn´t have enough milk when they were borned so since they were 1 week of age I only gave them soy milk. Even when they already ate some other food, I kept the soy milk until they were like 5 years old. Healthy and smart kids - never sick (unless a few colds).

I have never heart about soy producing cancer - on the contrary, I read it reduces the risk of cancer. Anyway, nothing could be totally good or totally bad.

If I have another baby or for my grandkids I will go for soy milk - BLINDFOLDED!!

Good luck!! Dairy allergy sometimes dissapear after a few years. I know there is also no lactose dairy which could be another possibility!!

Your son's doctor may not recommend soy because a certain percentage of children who are allergic to milk are also allergic to soy. The trouble with rice and soy milk is that the protein is not as readily digested as the protein in cow's milk. Also the calcium content of these milk substitutes is not naturally high. Make sure the rice milk has added calcium. The third thing is that cow's milk has Vitamin D and A. You may need to put your child on a multivitamin to make sure he is getting enough of those two vitamins, especially if he doesn't eat vegetables. Since baby's frequently outgrow milk allergies, you may want to get him tested in the future to see if he outgrows his allergy.

Hi. When my daughter was little, we used LactoFree baby products for her main mllk supply. You can still get it, I think. Also, you can try peppermint tea.
Hope this halpe.
N. K.

We live mostly dairy-free in our household. You will probably need to familiarize yourself with the "Nature's Market" section of Kroger for dairy-free snack ideas. Also, a monthly trip to Sprouts or Whole Foods or other specialty grocery store will keep you stocked on things he can eat.
Our pediatrician said we could just continue giving our son formula until he's 2. You can get the "Step 2" kind of whatever formula you were using. Or just give him the same formula. I read the labels of the regular vs. Step 2 and they're not any different except the Step 2 has a little more calcium.
I don't know why your doc would have recommended rice milk. I don't think it has any fat in it, and babies/toddlers need the fat for their brain development.
My older child drinks the Silk brand "Very Vanilla" soy milk. It is fortified with calcium, so I mix a little in with my son's formula at dinner time.
As far as making dairy-free meals, if I'm making something that includes cheese, I just leave cheese off of his portion. Even when we do homemade pizza, one quarter of it is cheese-less.
I could send you a list of things we eat for snacks that are dairy-free (Oreo cookies are a yummy treat occasionally! No milk in them!)