Dairy free breastfeeding?

[pancakes22]

Hi, went to a breastfeeding counsellor yesterday who believes my 6 week old has a posterior tongue tie. He is sometimes fussy on the boob pulling on and off, cries out with breast still in mouth, arches back and tense with some runny explosive poos. We have an appointment on Friday to get his tongue tie snipped.

She also suggested that I give up dairy to help his tummy. My HV has previously said not to give up foods to give his tummy a chance to get used to foods whereas she was shocked at this advice saying it was unfair for baby to be in pain if he's reacting to dairy.

My questions are...

Would you give up dairy now before tongue tie to see if any improvement in the next few days or would you wait until after tongue tie done on Friday to see if that fixes problems before changing diet? I have read that it takes 6-8 weeks to get out your system and so I'm worried I won't be able to isolate the two issues and see which one worked. I am already gluten free coeliac and so don't want to give up dairy if I can help it.

If I do give up dairy, how detrimental is it when trying to eliminate dairy in breast milk to have 'slip ups'. For example I am off to a wedding soon and it's too late for them to adjust dietary requirements so will likely need to eat dairy then. Will that then just affect him for that day or will that interrupt the whole elimination thing and I have to start again to build up to 6 weeks to see any improvement?

I would suggest wait for the tongue tie on Friday since it's only a few days away, then try dairy free if you still have bad results. By the time of the wedding you might not even need to go dairy free. How far away is the wedding? Are you sure they can't adjust your catering?

I’m going to say wait for the tongue tie because it worked for us - DC didn’t latch on until that evening and he was 9 days old, we tried so hard until then to no avail. It can make all the difference for some babies.

I can't help with the tongue tie but I'd say it's prob worth waiting to see if that solves things. My dd had cmpa and I was really strict and would have just not eaten it if I thought it might have dairy. If you contact the bride or groom and apologise and offer to contact the caterers yourself I'm sure they wouldn't mind.

I think it is far more likely to be the tongue tie so I’d wait and see how that goes. Also have a look on Kellymom about fast letdown and oversupply. He could be getting lots of foremilk and taking down air when he feeds.

My DS had tongue tie and CMPA.
Obviously you need to get the tongue tie divided ASAP and that might improve things completely.
But I'm not convinced that tongue tie causes runny explosive poos. (TMI alert) is there mucus in the poo? That can be a sign of allergy (irritated gut).
Personally I would go dairy free immediately, stay dairy free for 6 weeks and then do the "yoghurt test" (eat a portion of yoghurt and see how baby reacts). If symptoms return it confirms the allergy. If no symptoms after 72h then you go back to eating dairy.
Cutting out dairy is difficult at first but it's actually fine when you get used to it and find some alternatives and treats.
" I am off to a wedding soon and it's too late for them to adjust dietary requirements so will likely need to eat dairy then."
Unless the wedding is in less than a week, I'm sure it's not too late to let them know about dietary requirements. For our wedding it was very close to the day when we confirmed final numbers and dietary requirements for the catering.
There is excellent information and advice about breastfeeding with CMPA on this website: dilanandme.com/dairyfree/
(When I was still breastfeeding I had the treats list bookmarked on my phone!)
There's also an excellent FB group run by the author of the website.

I would give up dairy now - it takes so long to see a difference it will still be clear whether the tongue tie works as any improvement within a couple of weeks will be due to that. Our paediatrician was clear that if I saw any difference 'within a few days or couple of weeks' it was nothing to do with dairy as it would still be in both our systems.

I gave up dairy and saw no difference at all for six weeks, then suddenly DD was loads better. I'm still off dairy and successfully breastfeeding. Slip ups make a big difference to us (an accidental slice of toast with butter not so much, a cheese sandwich yes).

Is your breastfeeding counsellor medically qualified? If not you shouldn’t be listening to her over your HV.

@NameChange30 has excellent advice on this

Obviously breastfeeding counsellors have much more training in BREASTFEEDING and all associated issues (including tongue tie) than HVs do! HVs are notoriously ignorant about breastfeeding, reflux and allergies. Every single HV we saw/spoke to completely failed to even mention tongue tie, reflux and CMPA - let alone advise on dealing with them.

My youngest had tongue tie and CMPA, so I sympathise with how tricky this is when you're shattered with a newborn!

The explosive poos could be CMPA or too much foremilk because baby isn't latching well and tiring before getting to the hindmilk.

I'd hang fire on cutting out the dairy until the tongue tie is sorted, but perhaps avoid masses of dairy in its purest form (pints of milk, loads of cheese...)

I hope it settles down for you both soon

Thanks Dora I agree with your post too!

Incidentally I found out quite recently that butter has barely any cow's milk protein in it (so little that it's below step 1 on the milk ladder). I was a bit gutted about all the cakes I didn't eat because they contained butter, I'm sure I could have got away with it

You do have to be strict in the first 6 weeks but after that you could allow the odd minor slip up to see if baby tolerates it. But check the milk ladder and avoid things at the top.

Given your already restricted diet, I think I wouldn't give up dairy yet.
Get the tie divided, and give it a week. Maybe give up the massive dairy doses, but dont worry about small amounts.
Bizarrely, the first thing I tested my dairy free, bf (and posterior tongue tied) child on was butter, because I was really struggling with breakfast. He was ok with it. He also dealt with chocolate, and the occasional icecream. But he wasn't very sensitive, could deal with no obvious dairy, but not label reading when weaning, and was ok with drinking cows milk by his first birthday.

@NameChange30 oh I didn't know that about butter - DD is only 7 months and our paed was AMAZING and diagnosed her with reflux at 8 weeks (we thought there was something wrong with her bowels because of her runny, explosive, painful poos). Next step at our 9 month appointment is the milk ladder for DD ...

Will try butter as a sort of 'yoghurt test' again soon. I did it with cheese (on purpose to try and confirm the allergy). Also thanks for the list of dairy-free treats. I've discovered some myself but you can never have too many treat options

Good luck OP with sorting everything. I hope you find snipping the tongue-tie improves things (and you enjoy the wedding).

Dora
Butter won't do for the yoghurt test. The point of the yoghurt test is that it has to be something high up the milk ladder so there's enough cows milk protein for an obvious reaction (if they're going to react). To confirm an allergy you do the yoghurt test. To reintroduce dairy you do the milk ladder. I guess you could start with butter before step 1 of milk ladder.

OP, I like the compromise suggested by Rain and Tonker - avoid things at top of ladder for now, and go completely dairy free if no improvement within a few days of DD division.

Meanwhile maybe you could get some alternatives just in case. There are my recommendations:
Milk - Oatly Barista (works well with cereal and in tea/coffee)
Butter - Vitalite
Cream cheese - Nush
Ice cream - Almond Dream or Alpro Hazelnut Chocolate
...the treats list has loads more!

Meant TT division not DD division!