Weaning and dairy allergy/intolerance

[Gooddie]

Can anyone advise me what to do with weaning?

DD is 6 months and is ebf, but on solids for the past 2 weeks. She LOVES them and cries when I take the spoon away! She's only had fruit, veg, baby cereals and 1 tiny bit of toast.

I think she's either allergic or intolerant to dairy and waiting on a referral to a consultant to check it out.

Anyway, with my oldest daughter, I could put milk in Ready Brek and give her yogurts, etc. Obviously don't want to do that with her, so what could I use? I know some babies seem to be allergic to soya too, so don't want to use them either.

Also there seems to be milk in any of the baby cereals too, but she doesn't seem to be reacting to them at all.

Can anyone help me please?

My ds was exactly the same. ebf and although i knew if I ate dairy it upset him, so didn't, i didn't realise there was an issue until weaning. Ds could tolerate a small amount of milk which made the detection harder as he wasn't having alot as I was still breast feeding. I used plum cereals as they don't have milk in. I then mixed with expressed milk. Doc perscribed sma lf which still not right if given as drink but again he could tolerate in small amounts so used that in baby rice. avoided recipes containing milk, still do as soya milk seems to make the sauces funny but that could be my cooking. Luckily my ds was ok with soya so used soya yoghurts and now on alpro soya junior. can use regular soya but this is tastes nicer (personal preferance) and designed for kids.

If you dont want to use soya wait till youve seen consultant as they will give a suitable milk to try but i would keep breast feeding as we went through 4 different ones and each time it was alot easier to go back to the breast to sort out issues before trying another milk.

Hope that helps x

Hi gooddie, we were in a similar situation to you.

My DD was ebf until we started weaning, then had a reaction to yogurt.

Until you are seen by a consultant, you could use oatly milk in cooking, though not as a main drink. Its actually quite tasty and we used it between 6 months and 1 year as it is not recommended that babies use soya milk under 1 year old.

At 6 months your DD doesnt have to have baby cereals, porridge oats are fine and taste lovely made with oatly - very oaty and creamy! Though we did try the Plum baby porridge once which was milk free and quite nice.

Know that you dont want to try soya ATM, but when you are more sure, agree that soya yogurts are good. Alpro do a couple of different flavours, though Asda have an own brand version for £1 for a 4 pack and they seem to be just as tasty. Only downside is that the yogurts are adult size but we just used to keep half in a wee tub in the fridge for later. Soya yogurts and fruit pots are pretty handy for eating when out and about.

There are lots of recipes that are dairy free. Although I feel that a lot of recipe books aimed at weaning and toddlers have a lot of cheese in them! piginthekitchen has lots of good ideas.

My DD is now 22 months and has a milk, egg and nut free diet. Our favourites from 6 months have been veggie pasta (chopped very finely to start with, or pureed if you prefer), and spag bol. Avocado is also a fab weaning food and all veggies, particularly green veg which is full of calcium - your DD doesnt actually need a lot of dairy in her diet at the moment because you are breastfeeding.

Just as an aside, my DD was prescribed neocate but we chose not to use it. My DD was breastfeeding and I hadn't planned to introduce normal formula before we knew about the allergies anyway, so didnt see the point in using the neocate. As I said above, we just made sure that we were buying calcium enriched foods (oatly), and giving my DD plenty of brocolli etc, plus she breastfed on demand.

HTH

Thanks a mill. I didn't know that about the Plum range. Will check it out. Also didn't know that you couldn't use soy milk before 1 year...unfortunately i've used a tiny bit each day in her porridge as she hated it made on water and no matter how long I express, I get a bare dribble so can't use ebm. Will buy oat milk now.
also thanks for the tip about the brocolli...she loves it thankfully!
I've bought soya natural yoghurt and was planning to put puree fruit in it for her tea. Do you think that's ok?

Thanks again...great to hear from the experts!!

Wouldn't worry that you have used a little soya milk each day. Our consultant ibid soya yogurt fine after 6 months in I guess the reason for avoiding soya milk is because you are more likely to use larger quantities with it, if that makes sense.

Weaning doesn't need to include lots of dairy so try not to worry, especially while your breastfeeding. After 6 months your dd can eat pretty much everything (no nuts) anyway.