Talk to me about cow's milk protein intolerance

[buttonmoon78]

DS (9wks) has reflux, that much I know.

But he also has terrible wind - seriously bad. He belches after eating (it goes waaaay beyond burping) in a way which often throws his whole body back. He farts like a dirty old man (constantly and very loudly!), often crying as he does.

You can often hear his stomach growling and feel it through his clothes and blankets, as if it's tying itself up in knots.

This is dc4 so I know this is not 'normal' but does it sound like cmpi to you? I have an appointment with the gp tomorrow so though I'd try to go prepared.

What are his poo's like?

They will probably ask you that. I think they are looking for mucus poops.

Does he projectile vomit after feeds?
Skin conditions? Odd rashes?

I have a dairy-free kid and he was 1yr 6 months before diagnosis. It's not easy to say. i thought I was going to lose the plot cos' they kept saying tummy bug (the longest tummy bug ever).

If you are breastfeeding you can test it out yourself at home by not having dairy for a few weeks. It takes about 10 days for dairy to exit your body but for some babies/children a difference can be seen quicker. Then have dairy and see if symptoms reintroduce.

Drs might say it's reflux and wait until about 20 weeks to see if reflux gone..

Good luck...

hmmm well that could just be the reflux... all that acid upetting his tummy and making him burp etc?

ds2 has a CMP intolerance, his symptoms were:
inconsolable crying. for hours. during the day and night. very unhappy baby
eczema on his cheeks and body
very mucousy poo
very bad, vile smelling wind
he wasn't sick a lot, but when he was it was all curdled and smelled bad

you could try cutting out dairy and seeing if it made a difference, you'd need to do it for at least a couple of weeks and make sure you cut it all out completely.
but from your OP it wouldn't be the first thing to come to mind tbh

Unfortunately, he's ff so cutting it out for me would have minimal impact

His poos are odd at the moment as the gaviscon affects him so much. There sometimes are lumps of jelly/mucous in it. Also, explosive!

He doesn't projectile vomit but it does come out with force. And quantity.

Since going onto bottles (about 2.5wks ago) he has developed slight eczema.

He is generally happy (or want to be) but has bouts of screaming and shrieking.

Vomit is either instantaneous or much later, curdled and sour - but I put that down to the reflux.

His cousin has multiple allergies (inc dairy) and two of my other dcs are totally intolerant to wholewheat.

Sorry - meant to say, normally explosive and very frequent (after each feed) but at the moment the gaviscon means that every 30+hrs is more usual, very dry and powdery. Like homemade playdough.

i think, as he is formula fed, you would be seeing far more extreme symptoms by now tbh

Both my dds were intolerant to cow's milk protein. The symptoms were mucous and blood in stools. It is not painful in itself though. Neither of them had colic, and I have now developed an intolerance after cutting dairy products out for the 2nd time to bb dd2 and it does not cause any pain.

Well, that's good then, if it's unlikely to be that. Thank you for responses!

Though it still leaves me unable to work out what causes such pain and wind.

The Gaviscon may be causing him problems. Is there any chance of cutting it down at all?

Has this started since moving to formula or was it there before? Was there a problem before that made you choose to stop BFing?

He had reflux whilst I was bf. It wasn't one of the reasons I stopped but it was a pro iykwim? I've already had 2 others with reflux, one v badly so I know that it is far easier to deal with when ff (imo).

He was always excessively windy (with pain) and always explosive with his poos.

The constipation is definately to do with the gaviscon though. I tried him on the full 6 sachets a day and he didn't go for 3 days. So I cut it out and then have tried varying the dose until we reach an 'acceptable' balance. It seems 1/2 sachet in each bottle has some efficacy with an acceptable amount of constipation ie he will now manage to go every 30hrs generally. It still causes him a lot of grief but it gets out in the end!

Re stopping bf, he was veeeery slow putting on weight. I tried everything - tried to increase my supply, compressions, switch nursing, tt snip, babymooning - you name it, we tried it. He just wanted to suck and suck all the time. As in 22hours out of 24.

I've since learned that this is another symptom of reflux (he now has a dummy) but tbh I'm not sure it would have changed my mind even if I had known that. I have 3 other dcs and the youngest (4) was saying things like 'I wish he would go away', 'I didn't want a baby', 'I'm going to flush him down the loo' etc as he was missing out loads. So knowing the reason why wouldn't have changed his need.

So that was the main reason I stopped. The cost was too high for the others, in particular dc3. But I gave him 6.5-7wks. And I'm proud of that - not all babies even get that!

i would go back to the GP and ask about alternative medications.

it could just be that the gaviscon isn't agreeing with him and what you have is a bog-standard reflux case, but exacerbated by the gaviscon? that could be what is causing the pain and, obviously, the difficulty poo-ing/

Been to gp and finally (that's another thread though) been given ranitidine. So we're coming off the gaviscon immediately - yay!

We'll have to wait and see what effect this has.

Good - that might help. Gaviscon can be really horrible on their little tummies.

Sorry you had such a poor time BFing, but as you say, you did a great job getting to where you did :)

ahh glad you've got something else to try. hope it works for him :)