How will I know if it's an intolerance?

[suzi2]

Hopefully we'll be starting DS on solids in a few weeks time. He's exclusively breastfed at the moment. The problem is, he has bad eczema & rashes that flare up and down for no real reason. So how will we know if he has an intolerance or allergy?

Go very slowly with the introduction of new foods especially known allergens such as egg, milk, fish etc. Keep a dairy of symptoms and if you suspect food is playing a part remove the food for a few weeks and then retry and see what happens to symptoms. If you are really worried about a particular food you can get baby allergy tested. Good luck.

Don't introduce common allergens (egg, cows milk, fish, etc) until he is at least one year old (but keep away of nuts for as long as you can).

I followed GF's The Contented Little Baby Book of Weaning. I found her program for the introduction of food very very useful (DS had bad eczema and I was particularly interested in not including major allergens early to his diet). The book tells you in which order introduce the ingredients and allows you to try the new ingredients in "isolation" (the diet gets richer day by day, but every new ingredient is added one by one allowing for some time to check for reactions, so it becomes easier to identify possible problematic foods.

The recipes are very good, we still cook some of them but beware of those who include egg before the baby is one year old. OTH

Keep away from egg, fish, wheat, milk, nuts, tomato, kiwi, pineapple.

Don't ever think you are going too slow or that he will get bored. He won't. He also won't miss out by not eating toast - he has no idea what it tastes like.

You can make baby rice with water, you can have water with oats, you can make lots of things and simply add water. Don't get fooled by how much milk we use. Some cultures don't use milk and their children are okay.

Give him probiotics and flax seed oil.

Intolerances, from what I know, are relatively subtle things. They're generally problems digesting things, so often manifest as wind or poo problems. But most babies struggle with wind and poo, so these are hard to spot. You may find that some foods make your son's eczema worse.

Allergies tend to be more obvious, but I understand why you're concerned about spotting them, with the rashes. Are the rashes welty? or just red? I think red bits and pimples and so on are just typical of lovely baby skin.

Generally, strong allergic reactions include hives, often on the mouth/face. Here is a link about hives, with a picture, and a description.

Thanks guys - I thought this post has nose dived a death!

Thanks for the tips about things to avoid. Nice to know I can use water instead of milk for things - I was considering using breastmilk but I can't express that much.

NQC - thanks for the link. I'm not sure why I'm panicking so much as I have allergies (welty ones, with hives and an anaphylactic one) and recognise and cope with them well. I guess I'm just trying to spare DS and don't want to get it wrong. I'm sure we all have slight intolerances that we don't worry about so I'm not sure why it concerns me so much! These babies - what do they do to us

Leave your ds to get the breastmilk out in the most efficient way and use water for things - couldn't understand people who did loads of expressing for food and then gave their little ones water - why just not reverse it!

my ds had an intolerance to all dairy...he was living off of soya for along along time..............it was very easy to see that he had it from the first few times i gave him dairy............he was in hospital over a christmas....sick , diarria...lost lots of weight , could only stomach soya.......deffo lactose intolerance ....if he has an allergy or reaction...you will know about it.

but you'll be pleased to know that most grow out of an intolerance......my ds is perfectly fine with all dairy now....he grew out of it slowly....he's now 21months and eats/drinks fine......(milk in moderation tho)