I have to cut out dairy. Oh shit...

[KnickedIt]

DS is 6 weeks old and it's likely based on his horrid symptoms he has an issue with cows milk or dairy.

I need to cut out dairy, cold turkey, and this weekend has been a struggle. No advent calendar, no pizza with DH and DSD, no nice butter, no Christmas biscuits etc. It's so hard! I've gone cold turkey and will continue but I'm hating it.

Any advice? Do babies grow out of it? Or am I doomed for no chocolate for the next two years?!

Dark chocolate doesn’t have dairy in.

Lots of home baking with sunflower dairy-free Marge.

Yes they generally do. Both my DD's had quite severe CMPA. The eldest outgrew it at 18 months and the youngest is getting better she's currently 13 months and we started her on the milk ladder a month ago.
Both mine were formula fed and ended up on an amino acids formula Neocate so I never had the experience of giving up dairy. Wishing you lots of luck with it and that you see an improvement in your DS's symptoms as having a poorly baby with a dairy allergy at that age is really hard work. The allergies board is usually pretty good for advice about going dairy free yourself and in regards to dairy free weaning
Good luck!

It's unlikely that your little one will grow out of it before 2. But it doesn't mean you need to continue breastfeeding till that long.

You have options. You can put him on allergy free formula from now so he gets used to it, and you can continue BFing whilst dairy free, and completely switch over to formula when your baby turns 1.

Thankfully there is plenty on the market for dairy free, so don't be too dismayed.

try vego chocolate if you only like milk chocolate.
My fave dairy free chocolate is the coconut dark chocolate from waitrose. Its worth going to waitrose for. Its so creamy.
Oat milk is the best out of the dairy free milks IMO. Avoid soya unless you are sure its not cows milk protein is the issue, because soya protein is virtually identical as far as the body is concerned.

Cheese - well theyre all crap. Violife is the least disgusting, but I sometimes find that a bit of maggi liquid seasoning on top of soups or whatever i might have had cheese on gives quite a satisfying umami flavour that makes cheese less important.

Definitely dairy free isn't as hard as it used to be. Some of the soya yogurts particularly their vanilla one is absolutely delicious! Their custard isn't too bad either! I have a tendency to scoff DD2's when there are left overs.
As pp said dark choc is ok if you have a sweet tooth!
Cakes and biscuits can easily be supplemented with dairy free marg or something like an apple crumble. It's really do-able just requires a little more prep

That yoghurt made from coconut milk is delicious. Pricey, but delicious.

Look out for vegan cheese to make pizza with, it melts like Edam.

Buy yourself some nice sweets , like fruity chews , and posh nuts for snacking

oat milk is lovely and can be used for pancakes and custard

My husband couldn't have cows milk and could only tolerate goats milk when he was a baby. I don't think you need to cut out dairy for the whole family that's a bit extreme

My ds has just been diagnosed with an I tolerance to cows milk protein. He is 8 so obviously I'm no longer breastfeeding! But I am trying to cut out cows milk, in solidarity.

Top tips:

• goats milk is not totally disgusting. We have found the St Helens one much nicer than the Delamere one.
• manchego cheese works well as cheddar substitute, it's made with ewe's milk
• goats butter is quite nice
• Swedish glacé ice cream is dairy free and totally delicious
• most dairy free milk chocolate is grim. But the asda free from chocolate buttons are not too bad
• yy to home baking with stork
• we found an amazing chocolate covered vegan fudge at a farmers market the other day. No idea how they did it but it was fabulous - so there is stuff out there

Recently, I've discovered marinara pizza, i.e. pizza without cheese. It's yummy and I don't miss the cheese at all...

I had to do the same but I’ve never been a big fan of dairy so it wasn’t too hard. I do love cheese though so I had to give that up.
Otherwise, oat, almond or coconut milk for porridge and coffees, baking with vitalite or other dairy free spread. Oat milk is good for when you don’t want a flavour like for mashed potato or a white sauce. Bourbon biscuits are dairy free.
There are plenty of dairy free ice creams too.
It won’t be too difficult.
My ds grew out of it eventually too.

Tesco is your friend. When I was doing it, their Free From range was great.

That said, after 4 weeks things hadn't improved and my GP said it looked like it might be either something else or a mixture of dairy and something else. And since an elimination diet was seriously inadvisable in a breastfeeding mother, I needed to consider Neocate.

So I did (thank god DS was happy on bottles of expressed milk) and hey presto it was a very quick change. So it was definitely the right thing for us. We got the Neocate on prescription and he absolutely thrived on it.

Being dairy free is hard. I don't think I could have done it indefinitely.

DS couldn't take milk yet by 12 months but we kept trying tiny bits of dairy each month and he was fully OK with milk by 18 months.

I've just discovered vegan rice pudding- just substitute the milk for coconut milk. It's delicious and last night I added a bit of cocoa . That definitely satisfies my chocolate cravings!

Having just been in your situation here is what kept me afloat-

Oreos
Dark chocolate almond milk
Oatly creme fraiche substitute (instead of sour cream )
Sainsbury's free from range- particularly the brownies and Bakewell tarts
Always having some kind of dairy free treat with me and possibly milk too for hot drinks
Ben and jerrys dairy free range
Most coffee shops do dairy free milks
Vegan friendly places
Just not bothering with cheese substitutes
Homemade guacamole
Betty Crocker chocolate fudge buttercream is dairy free

If your baby has suspected CMPA then please don't any goat or sheep's milk!

I went dairy and soya free for a year with each of my babies, it's not easy but not horrific. Most chocolate bourbon biscuits and Oreos are safe, I lived on them!

Don’t look for a direct like for like swap - you’ll only be disappointed.

I’m veggie and eat a fair amount of vegan food for preference.
Co-yo yoghurts are good.
Oat or rice milk if you want to try with tea.
Almond and hazelnut milk is lovely in porridge (if you can have nuts).
Look up American cake recipes - they tend to use oil instead of diary.

Most ‘free from’ ranges tend to be expensive, full of crap and not that nice.

Oh, yes yes to Swedish Glacé vegan ice-cream. Raspberry one is lovely.

Everything is fine apart from cheese, if you need pizza then Zizzis do a very good vegan one! There is a great Facebook group CMPA breastfeeding support. Chocolate Bourbon biscuits and Betty Crocker icing got me through tough days 😂.

I went dairy free for DS2. Was vegetarian at the time and then decided to not go back to it fully. Now feeding DS3 and fully dairy/meat free.

Try this mug cake for a carb loaded snack. It’s tastes yummy...

2tbsp plain flour
2tbsp Castor sugar
2tbsp cocoa powder
2tbsp veg oil
2tbsp dairy free milk (I love Oatly Barista)
3tbsp water.

Mix it up and put in microwave for 1 min and enjoy!

I use vitalite spread. Coconut yoghurt. Oatly or coconut cream. I just use the alternatives in recipes and they usually work fine. Violife cheese is nice. Pizza Hut use it on their pizza’s. Eating out is fine as lots of dairy free options in most places now. Much easier than 6 years ago when I last had to do it.

I went dairy free for over two years with dc3 (at 4, he’s still dairy intolerant). We did a mix of oat and almond milk, oatly cream substitute is good for cooking. Found oat milk better than almond for things like bechamel etc. Most high quality dark choc brands are dairy free anyway (green&blacks and Lindt 70% bars for example)
Our fave spread is flora dairy free, we all still have it now. Pure and vitalite are amongst the other options. Tesco free from fromsge frais and yogurts are ok.

My little buy outgrew CMPA at 14 months. We are dairy free all that time. Agree Oreos and dark chocolate are amazing. I didn't like dark chocolate before. Love it now. Oatly barista milk with whittards peanut butter hot chocolate was amazing. Also peanut butter and oat cakes are a great snack for breastfeeding. If you have any vegan restaurants around you make use of them. Especially for cake!! Chinese and Thai food are usually safe and also chapatis if you like Indian food. Good luck. You can do it. Lots of Facebook groups for support and ideas xx

@PragmaticWench why not goats milk or ewe's milk if its cmpa? We were advised that cows milk protein is only in... well, cows milk, and that other milks would be fine.

Genuine question, I'm still on a learning curve.

beela hope wench doesn't mind me saying, but its because the proteins are too similar, so the body is likely to react in the same way, but if your hcp's have said it's okay then carry on with their advice.

Labelling is much better now than it used to be years ago, but you still need to check everything. Yesterday I bought bread containing our two allergens! Aaargh.