To expect the NHS to pay for me to breast feed

[pamplem0usse]

OK so not quite:
10 week old DS has a cows milk allergy. He's EBF so the only solution currently is for me to cut out all dairy from my diet. I'm already a pescatarian.
Dairy free alternatives seem to be really expensive.... AIBU to think I should be able to be prescribed some of these given (a) the amount of money I'm saving them on hypoallergenic formula and (b) since I'm likely to save them significant amounts of cash by helping prevent further allergies develop....

[NotQuintAtAllOhNo]

I am right now going to send NHS an invoice for the money I have saved them by not smoking!



OP, do you not realize that the NHS is not a health insurance, nor is the NHS responsible for your health: YOU ARE. You are responsible for the health of yourself, and your baby. You dont get money back from them by trying to stay healthy or trying to prevent further problems developing. It is YOUR life and YOUR responsibility. Your gain if you stay healthy. They are there to help IF a problem develops, not WHEN!

You have a very skewed and entitled way of thinking.
Yabu.

[CouthyMowEatingBraiiiiinz]

I'll fish it out later, I've got to go and get the older DS's from school. And persuade DS3 into clothing first. Hopefully the fact that he is asleep will make that slightly easier...

[CouthyMowEatingBraiiiiinz]

Toys - to wash them, fill a bathtub with water and Milton sterilising fluid. Leave for 30 minutes. Quick scrub and all done.

[Teafairy]

CouthyMowEatingBraiiiiinz should probably clarify that it's the cocoa and beetroot recipe i'm after!

[fallingsun]

Yabvvu. My dd was lactose intolerant and I'm vegetarian too, it never occurred to me to charge the NHS for breastfeeding! So a cancer patient misses out on vital treatment because you want to be paid?!

Soya milk is no more expensive than cows milk, look in the ambient aisle rather than the fridge. Eat puddings rather than chocolate treats etc. Cutting out dairy is a pain but worth it for your dc to get the benefits of bf surely?

[SCOTCHandWRY]

Goats milk is very likely to be a bad idea to tbh.

Why Duck? Unless the child is also allergic to goat milk, there isn't a problem - but you need to try it to find out - DH is a Dr and recommended we try DS4 first on Goat milk, as the special formulas are very poorly tolerated by some of his patients (they taste and smell awful), especially if they are older babies when they first get the formula.

Our DS is fine with Goat milk, but now he's a little older (2) we have tried him on some dairy free things which have soya in - and he reacts worse to that than Cows milk (I understand some of the proteins in soya are very similar).

[NotQuintAtAllOhNo]

There is no lactose in Goats milk, so goats cheese is a great option.

My son has no lactose intolerance, but he reacts terribly to soy products (I know because my aunt is lactose and GF free, and everytime I have baked cakes with soy cream, my son is unwell for a week) which apparently have more allergens than cows milk?

[Acekicker]

Gosh OP, you've taken a bit of a pasting...I think it might have helped if you hadn't got defensive but I'll cut you some slack as kids with allergies is a nightmare area and I suspect with a 10 week old and a bunch of hospital visits already under your belt with them you're possibly on a bit of an uneven keel...

There is some really good advice in the thread, if you can sift that out you should find it is a lot cheaper than you think. Stop trying to substitute dairy and think of different things to eat - the best tips at the general level are think either mediterranean (tomato based sauces etc) or chinese/asian (coconut milk for curries, very very few dairy products in Chinese/Japanese type dishes). Also dairy free stuff can come at the cheap end of supermarket stuff where proper butter etc would be more expensive - best example off the top of my head would be bourbon creams which I think are dairy free (disclaimer it's a few years since I was dairy free).

If you go for the 'free-from' range then it will be more pricey - it's a captive market unfortunately. Ask your local supermarket (Tesco, Sainsbury's etc) to send you their dairy free product list, you'll be surprised how much there is you can eat. Also have you asked about seeing a dietician, if you are struggling then (without wishing to be ironic) you might benefit from the advice they could give you. You do need to keep calcium levels up - things like walnuts, spinach, calcium enriched soya milk etc are good for that and white bread has more calcium than brown I think.

[SCOTCHandWRY]

It's the Protein, not the milk sugar (lactose) which is the issue for the OP's child, but yes, soya is a very common allergy.

[RabbitsMakeGOLDBaubles]

It is very hard to go dairy free, I will have to admit, they get CMP into all sorts of things! Anything processed is a nightmare, when I was trying to do a complete dump of dairy I found it was in practically everything I used. She's better now, no longer allergic, but I don't envy anyone the difficulty of raising children with these sorts of allergies.

It's common to look at the negatives of the situation first OP, when you stop reeling I reckon you'll see the fact that you are able to effectively filter your child's food by changing what you eat, as a bit of a Godsend, because it gets harder once you wean and don't always have sole control of what goes in his mouth.

And I do get the CRAP I didn't ask for this, how on earth can I afford to do this reaction, but there'll be other solutions out there than simply overloading the NHS prescription peeps. Once your DS is three months old, if the condition is seriously impacting on your ability to care normally for the child, you might consider DLA, which can absorb some of the difficulties of having an allergic child brings. It's a long hard slog sometimes, being controversial and debating is all well and good, but first off I'd focus on getting some support into place and Mumsnet is a good place for it, if you go about it the right way.

[BalloonSlayer]

and at all the people saying that dairy free is no more expensive than dairy.

Unless your dairy purchases are from Duchy Originals or some other posh supplier then dairy free is significantly more expensive.

Put more simply - if you are on a budget and need to buy cheaper foods, this is significantly more difficult on a dairy-free diet.

Someone upthread mentioned Swedish Glace dairy-free "ice cream." I agree, it is delicious and the only decent dairy free "ice cream" you can buy.

The plain vanilla one is £3.31 for 750 ml

Tesco sell plain vanilla ice cream at 70p for 2 LITRES!

Yes of course you can find a vanilla ice cream for £3.31 for 750g. But most people with young families don't spend anything like that much. Most people with young families are trying to stretch their budgets, buying 10p yogurts etc - which you just cannot do on a dairy free diet.

[KatAndKit]

I think the people that are saying dairy free is no more expensive mean that it can be cheap if you don't try to buy dairy substitutes such as the ice cream you mentioned. Simply stop eating yoghurt, ice cream, cheese and so on. Ok I agree that is a massive pain in the arse if you like those things. But there is no actual need for a human being past weaning age to eat any milk products - it is just something that many people enjoy. therefore there is no need either to eat substitute yoghurts. Eat something different instead.

[pamplem0usse]

Thanks for all the useful advice about things I can eat.... I think I was in part a bit shell-shocked. I've been surviving on hummus for two days!!
For the record: I don't expect the NHS to pay for my dairy-free products, but I am incredibly frustrated by the diminishing number of economic things that I can eat, and the need to create two lots of meals for my family.
As I mentioned earlier, my lovely little chap has been spending 8-10 hours a day screaming, and sleeps very little, which is not easy with a toddler to care for too. I am, of course, overjoyed to get to the bottom of the problem after the best part of two months spent at the Doctors (I've had thrush and mastitis to deal with to boot, and DS also has a tongue tie), however it's difficult to see the wood for the trees when you're this tired. And when you're shattered and having nice things to eat has been the tiny thing that gives you pleasure when dealing with the 10+ people a day who ask you if your child is OK ('not really') or needs feeding ('not really') because he's screaming, it's a bit of a B%^*(& to have that taken away!

[ChazsBrilliantAttitude]

BalloonSlayer
The Swedish Glace vanilla is £2.20 in Sainsbo's but I get your point.

Pamplemousse
It would probably be worth looking for some vegan recipies as they are guaranteed to be dairy free.

Just in case you ever need it - you can get dairy free chocolate as well
www.alotofchocolate.co.uk/menu/dairy-free-chocolates/all-dairy-free-chocolates

[ChazsBrilliantAttitude]

Here are some vegan ideas (which you can add fish & eggs to)

www.vegansociety.com/lifestyle/food/recipes/

www.bbcgoodfood.com/content/recipes/vegetarian/vegan/

[FlangelinaBallerina]

NotQuint evidently decided to ignore the request not to be fucking stupid. Hope you get some more sleep soon OP!

[SackGirl]

I agree with some posts that you could just try and cut out most dairy and just have the odd lactofree thing, but YANBU to ask for some sort of advice/help - Alot of people get their Infacol free/ colief... and as you said special freefrom formula. Breast is best, so really they should be doing everything to encourage/help you

[BalloonSlayer]

Chazs Computer crashed when I tried to look it up on Tesco's web site so I just googled it and got that price off the 1st website that came up!

While I am on me soap box Waitrose seem to be bringing in the Moo Free stuff which seems horrendously expensive

[ilovemydogandMrObama]

am not sure going dairy free would work, or at least it didn't for me, and have been told by doctors and a b/fing councillor that it's a myth...

I had to stop b/fing DS because he was CMP allergic, and he went onto Neocate.

Anyway Booja Booja chocolate is great. Dairy and soya free but eye waveringly expensive...

[12ylnon]

Well YABU. It's a real pain, i know. Almond milk or rice milk is not that expensive and yummier than soy (blleugh). My solution was to just eat less milk and cheese, and get my calcium, protein etc from other sources.

[nannyl]

pamplemousee

just wanted to say well done for doing what you are doing

I too would not like to go dairy free, but would if my baby needed me too...... but plenty of people may choose to go down the dairy free formula route too.

yes with a baby and toddler i would need a cup of tea (with cow milk) and a slice of cake etc etc. (can easily make cakes with pure or vitalite or stork etc which although not quite as nice as butter, still make yummy enough cakes!)

[Stylelostinlabour]

YABU - See this is the problem people don't understand what the NHS is actually for - its for medical care at the point of need. Think bleeding to death, heart attack RTA... You get idea...

Feeding ones child is a basic requirement of a parent be that a special diet due to health reasons such as allegies religious reasons or because you decide a specific diet

[melliebobs]

pamplem0ouse SMA WySoy (which my dd is being moved onto at almost 9 months after being bf) is available at Tesco. She's getting it in prescription but if you want to save the NHS soooooo much money why not get it from there?!

[CouthyMowEatingBraiiiiinz]

Going free from worked for my DS3. I just had to be religious about it and read the label of every damn thing that passed my lips and crossed my threshold!

Even bloody crisps have milk in! I have to avoid casein and whey too, as well as lactose and cow's milk protein.

Soy milk is not advised as a milk substitute as a main drink any more, and rice milk is not to be used for under 5's.

Oatly is a good substitute. Or Hemp milk.

Almond milk needs careful thought - I discovered my DS3's nut allergy when the GP advised me giving him almond milk on his cereal. He went into anaphylaxis.