Weaning lactose intolerant/milk allergic DD?

[ess]

DD is 6months next week. I've already tried her with some mashed veg/fruit the last couple of weeks and she seems quite interested. She's been on a hypoallergenic formula for suspected milk intolerance/allergy so I'm not sure what else I can give her.

I understand babies with a lactose intolerance can tolerate small amounts of cheese/yoghurts but do I need to rule milk out completely- butter, it's in some breads, loads of things. I asked My GP if he thought I needed a referral to a dietician and he nearly laughed at me- "Just keep trying her with the cows milk formula every now and then". Thats all well and good but I need to know what to do food wise in the mean time. I'm going to start on finger foods shortly (gave her mashed first as I'm a bit of a coward and her gums have been really sore too). She already holds the spoon and shoves it in!

Any tips would be great, thanks.

My dd (now 20 months) is lactose intolerant, and like your dd is on hypoallergenic formula. Our HV referred us to a dietician, effectively by-passing our GP .

The advice I was given was to avoid all dairy at first because even a little bit of dairy gave her tumy ache, but try her with soya alternatives, eg yoghurts, etc (Alpro do a really good range), and also to try introducing soya formula (not soya milk from cartons because it doesn't have the right vitamins/minerals) rather than milk formula - we use SMA Wysoy.

So for weaning I started with baby rice made with hypoallergenic formula, mashed banana, fruit pureee, then veg like potatoes, broccoli, carrots and cauliflower cooked until it was quite soft, and baby rice cakes. Then I introduced whatever I was making for us thoroughly mushed (at first I sieved it as well).

I've got very good at reading labels - it doesn't take long to work out what brands of bread, baby snacks (Organix ones are good) are suitable. I've modified my cooking to suit dd in that I don't make creamy sauces any more or use cheese in cooking (if dh and I want it, we add it later), but I mostly cook from scratch anyway. If you use ready prepared things, then your choice will be restricted as you will find milk and lactose in a lot of apparently random products.

For baking or anything in cooking that needs butter I use Pure sunflower spread - it works a treat, and it is OK to use soya milk in cooking as long as you don't use it in dd's bottles. You can make custard with Wysoy, but the taste and consistency is weird - I use Alpro ready made soya custard, which tastes like the real thing! I found Annabel Karmel's baby and toddler cookbook useful for ideas. Where she uses butter, substitute sunflower or olive oil, or Pure spread.

Dd can now tolerate little bits of dairy, which makes life a lot easier, as I don't have to worry about making sure I have food for her - it's amazing how many places have very little on the menu that doesn't involve some form of butter, cheese etc .

HTH

Thanks Roskva- was the dietician a help? May give my HV a ring actually- havent seen him for months so could do with a chat. Thanks for the tips. Does sunflower spread have no milk in then? Thats good to know for cooking/toast etc.

No probs .

Some sunflower spreads do have dairy in them, but the Pure ones are fine, as is the Suma soya spread, which I have also successfully used for baking. I've turned into the annoying person in the supermarket who stands there reading the labels on everything (though after a while you get to know which things are suitable).

I forgot to mention, the dietician told me to introduce soya formula gradually, starting by replacing one scoop of hypoallergenic formula with one scoop of soya formula, and build up over a few days to a bottle which is entirely soya. If your dd reacts badly, then obviously go straight back to the hypoallergenic formula, and wait a few months before trying again. My dd still has hypoallergenic formula at bed time, because too much soya seems to give her diarhoea (sp?).

And the dietician has been quite helpful, especially at first, and now it's useful to have someone I can ask those silly questions about dd's food without having to explain that 'no, she can't have milk, and no, I'm not a paranoid parent'.

Out of interest, why did they change over to Soya formula- at what age. I am very anti it I'm afraid(do a search on me and you'll see why). Managed to get some Pure spread today so thats good and going to see my HV on Monday.

Oops, I disappeared off line for a few days. The dietician suggested the soya formula as she thought if dd could cope with it then it is more likely that she's intolerant to lactose than to milk protein. I'm not sure I follow the logic, because presumably soya protein is different to milk protein, but there you go. Anyway, I decided to give it a go, because if dd can have soya products, it opens up a wider dietary range of products (and makes desserts easier). Anyway, too much soya, formula or other, seems to give dd diarhoea (sp?), so she has soya formula in the morning and nutramigen at bed time.

Have you managed to get a referral to a dietician?

No. HV said he didn't think it neccessary and try her with cooked cheese maybe (he thought the proteins would be ok as cooked? .

Just going to avoid it I think. We've been doing mashed ved and some finger foods and all seems to be going well. Thanks again.

my dd is lactose/milk protein intolerant too, and although my hv referred me to a dietician, i didn't really think it was worth it tbh, the dietician gave me different recipes i could make with my nutramigen formula (which are pretty obvious amo - anything you would normally make with milk, substitute formula) and she didnt give me any advice re bread/baked products. I give dd bread and she doesnt seem to react to it, so i'd try it and see (obviously it will depend on how ba your childs reaction to milk is, but mine gets eczema so its easy to tell.

The only good advice she did give me was to be careful with egg, bcause dairy allergic children can react badly to eggs, she said to try the yolk of a hard boled egg first as all of the allergens are contained in the white, and then try the white. She also aid to try child on a bit of cows milk mozzarella cheese, because it as a low lactose level. if baby reacts it means that they are likely to have milk protein intolerance rather than lactose, and if ey dont react you can build up to more and more mozzarella over time to build up baby's imunity t lactose, so they can eventually tolerate "normal" dairy products. When you try this, choose a tme when baby is well and not teething, otherwise you'll never know if its the food or other things that are making them unwell.

i thought the same as your hv about cooked milk/cheese, but apparently not, unless you heat them at incredibly high temps for a long period of time, the milk proteins are not broken down.

my dd eats almost anything, i give her soya cheese slices as a ubstitute for cheese and keep her formula intake up.
HTH.