Help with Premature Thelarce, Soy Formula and Dairy Intolerance

Greetings H.,

My name is D.. My daughter was allergic to wheat and soy products which the soy showed up very early on. By the time she was 6 or 7 months, I had switched her over to Enriched Rice drink and her pediatrician just monitored her. No other developments. Also Almond milk is a good choice over soy products. Good luck

You might want to check out the Weston Price website. (Dr. Price was a dentist who studied nutrition in people groups arouond the world - fascinating!) Anyway, their website has information about soy formula (the organization is actually trying to get infant soy formula banned for exactly the reason you mentioned - it upsets the delicate hormone balance of babies - worse for boys even) as well as information about feeding babies and milk allergies, etc. www.westonaprice.org

I hope this helps!
C.

You situation with not producing enough milk is typical when paired with formula supplementation.
As a previous poster said, nursing more often will increase your milk supply. The bottles are replacing your baby's nursing sessions, which tells your body not to produce more milk.
If you quit formula, and strictly breastfeed, you will produce all the milk your baby needs, and eliminate the need for any formula- be it soy or cow's milk variety.

I know a family whose daughter was diagnosed with Premature Thelarche, and it is being blamed on animal products in her diet- namely dairy. She is 8 years old. I do not know if soy can have this effect, but I have heard that if you must use formula, a quality cow's milk formula is better than soy in many ways. (After a child reaches one year old, though, regular soy milk is better than whole cow's milk) However, breast milk beats formula of any kind, so if you don't have to supplement with formula, don't do it!

A good book to read is The Breastfeeding Book by Dr. Sears, and Disease-Proof Your Child, by Dr. Joel Fuhrman.

Both of my daughters have had soy formula and had no problem. My 3 year old was on soy from 8 weeks until about 14 mo. and is developing normally. My 6 mo old daughter has been normal as well. A good friend of mine had a daughter with a milk allergy and used Enfamil Nurtamagin with great success. It is very expensive though. Good Luck!

My youngest is lactose intolerant. We went with a lacto free formula and all our issues disappeared. He is 20 months now and doing wonderful on a lacto free milk.

Hi H.-I have read the responses and let me give you some background. I have been a naturalist and studying herbology and using all holistics for over 7 years and I owned my own in home daycare for 8 years and have 4 children.

One-some women just do not produce enough breast milk, so do not get stressed. If you completely relax this will help your milk supply. Since this is your first child-you can let the baby nurse more frequently which means you may have to do this every 60-75 minutes.

NO baby should ever get soy or dairy formula. And yes you are right. Soy has the phytoestrogens which if there is estrogen dominance the body will turn it into more estrogen. Plus it is not in its natural state. (NOT edamame-organic is great for you) They can not digest as adults cannot either. it is not in natural form. Dairy is made for baby cows, not people. However-you can get a formula made with whey. I have heard there are some organic products on the market only if you can not start producing more milk. She is 6 months old now, if she is sitting on her own and able to put hand to mouth you can feed her avocadoes, squash and bananas for starters. I have one of the best doctors in the area and this is his recommendation. I also have an infant who is 5 months old, and because she is not ready to eat that yet, I just started juicing for her because no matter what remedy I tried, she was just too hungry, so I know how hard that is. If you would like suggestions. and recipes let me know.

As far as the thelarche it is from environmental toxins that she was exposed to when you were pregnant. You also have estrogen dominance which is caused by eating conventional meats, chicken, dairy just to name a few. Most people do not understand or know about this. It can and will cause long term health issues. There are some very simple things that you can do to help cleanse your systems out. For baby-I would immediately get her to a chiropractor. They are usually great at dealing with issues like this and can even make more recommendations. Let me know if you would like some more info. I would love to help you out, but it is to involved to discuss thru email. Please feel free to email me at ____@____.com

or call me at ###-###-####

Thanks and you are doing wonderfully. Kudos to you on doing some research before you make this decision and getting the information.

T.

HI, I don't think you have to go back to a dairy formula if you don't want to. You may want to discuss the soy formula again with your doctor, and find out why she is not concerned as there may be no concern there (I know journalism is publishing findings, but they are still inconclusive.) Also, she may know of some type of powder to add to something like rice milk(?) There may be some kind of powder for babies with alot of allergies that we don't know about. Good luck!

Have you tried hypoallergenic formula yet? Similac and Enfimil make a hypoallergenic formula. I have two children with milk allergies (and soy!) so I nursed forever but I supplemented with hypoallergenic. It is expensive and smells gross but, hey, sometimes we don't have a choice!! ;)

By the way, milk and soy allergies are related ...there is a 75% crossover (if allergic to milk, probably allergic to soy). So, it is probably best to stay away from soy (besides the hormone stuff too!).

H.,

I can understand your concern for your child. My daughter has been to a pediatric endocrinologist for premature thelarche. She developed a breast bud at 6 months as well, and initially the doctors said this is fairly normal, but to keep an eye on it. This may be why you don't see your doctor getting too concerned just yet. Her bud went away and returned when she was 10 months old. At that time, we switched her to glass bottles (due to concern about bisephenol A), and our doctor had us do an ultrasound. Once the results were in, she referred us to the endocrinologist. Her bud disappeared again and has not returned since, but she sees the endocrinologist every few months to keeps an eye on her development. It can be pretty overwhelming, but keep your head up and just stay on top of it and stay informed.
I cannot speak to your concerns about soy formula, but I would suggest you talk with your doctor again if you have serious concerns. Dr. Sears is a great resource too! http://www.askdrsears.com/html/0/T000100.asp

Let me know if you have any questions.

Sincerely,

H. S

I am no doctor but can only share my experience. The best info can come from your ped.

I breastfed for 4months and then switched to formula. early transition period was fine, then I started to notice fussiness, etc. I asked my ped about soy and she was very against it and said most make the jump too quickly. She recommended Enfamil Gentlease and give 1-2 oz. of prune juice a day. That did the trick for us.

Babies digestive systems are not mature until they're 2 or 3 years old ( maybe even older) so they have a harder time digesting foods. Usually the prune supplement will help them digest and tolerate the formula. At almost 10 months, my littl one is still on Gentlease even though i've tried the switch back to Enfamil Lipil. She also gets prunes every morning for breakfast.

Again, according to my ped....soy is not the formula of choice and should only be used when other options ar xhausted.

not familiar w/ thelarche, but did have a similar situation w/ formula & dairy intolerance. we tried the sensitive, lactose-free formulas and that didn't help. i talked to a couple peds who both recommended against even trying soy so we put her on elecare (made by the co that does similac) and noticed a big decrease in her colic and gas w/in just a couple days. it's an amino-acid based hypoallergenic formula that's lactose-, soy-, gluten-, etc.- free; for highly sensitive babies. it's a bit pricey, but totally worth it to not see that look of pain in her eyes from that horrible gas. she's like a different baby! the cheapest i've been able to find it is online at drugstore.com for $33/can.

also, you mentioned that you've taken out of your diet. not sure if you've completely taken it out, are "pumping and dumping" or what method you're doing. but thought i'd share something i learned from my ped when i was going through this...if you consume dairy, it can stay in your system for up to 2 weeks. so if you were to "pump and dump" after having a food with some form of dairy as an ingredient, it could theoretically pass through your breast milk for up to 2 weeks. also, the dairy intolerance could be lactose and/or casein (milk protein.) so be on the lookout for anything that has casein in the ingredient, it may have no other dairy reference, but if it's got casein in there, that is a component of dairy and thus could cause an intolerance/reaction.

hope this helps and good luck!

I think that's awesome that you're still breastfeeding. I know it might be a little expensive but have you considered an organic formula? I don't think it can get any safer than that. And you would only do it for another 6 moths. I have a friend who fed her son soy formula because he was lactose intolerant and than at a year went to rice milk. He's now 2 and still drinks his rice milk with table food. My only experience with organic formula was that it constipated my daughter so I switched to the ready to feed. A little expensive but for my daughter it was worth it! Just a suggestion...

Nutramigen is a dairy-free, soy-free formula. We used this because my son was allergic to both dairy and soy. The downside is that it is very expensive, even purchasing it at Target or Babies R Us. It was worth it for us though. He had no stomach pains and his excema cleared up.

I am not sure about what Premature Thelarche is, so this may sound stupid. but....all my kids had "breasts" due to my hormones passed through while in utero. I am not sure if the hormones were also passed through the breast milk, all my kids were nursed for a year, but they went away. Could this be the same for your little darling? Just wondering

I don't know anything about thelarce, but just wondered if you have tried using fenugreek for your supply issues? Also, the more you nurse the more it builds your supply...it is primarily supply and demand...so if you want to make more milk, you need to nurse nurse nurse. If you can spend a few days in bed with your baby just nursing any time she seems interested. Also there are some prescription drugs they can try to help supply but I would do the fenugreek and increased nursing first. You can find info about it and how much to take here: http://www.kellymom.com/herbal/milksupply/fenugreek.html

I have never heard of premature Thelarce, but my son who is now 5 1/2 years old had a dairy allergy. I nursed him for 13 months total ,I too had to stay away from large amounts of dairy- such as a large bowl of ice cream etc. while nursing, he had severe eczema that runs in the family. We then had him tested for allergies due to severe allergic reaction to some cheese- his face blew up red and swollen right before my eyes at 9 months. It happened 2 times so they did the testing and found he was allergic to milk, nuts, eggs and wheat! yikes it was difficult. Anyway- as I was weaning him I fed him soy formula- I think it was carnation for about 1 month. He had no problems- he then went straight to soy milk at about 13 months and loved it. Silk vanilla was the brand. It's actually delicious. My advice to you would be very careful when starting table food- the later the better- take it slow and suggest allergy testing. I was shocked to find out our son had all those allergies- It rocked my world. ALso if she does have allergies, be sure to educate family and friends not to give her anything without your permission. Perhaps she'll outgrow it all as my son did. It will all work out. GOod luck.

you can get her on nutramagin, aliementum or neocate infant. I would highly suugest theneocate infant and if you cannot affored it or cant get a prescription for the company you cn buy it on ebay, you will be soooooooo much happier and so will your baby and it will help with future allergies.
Fo not use soy for sure and do not go back to dairy
J.

I am not familiar with premature thelarche, but if you want to get your daughter off of soy formula, you could try a hypo-allergenic formula -- Nutramigen by enfamil is an option.

there is a family practice. Drs Renteia ( I am not sure of the spelling but it is eastern and western, main stream and holistic. I have had many friends turn to these drs when nothing else made any sense.
Good luck,

Hi H.,
I thought I would share my experience with my second daughter with you since it sounds very similar. I only breastfed my daughter but around 5 weeks old she got horrible eczema all over her face and then also got very colicky. She would be up all day long and then would finally pass massive amounts of gas and then pass out from exhaustion. She would comfort nurse a lot because she was so uncomfortable. I removed dairy, soy and gluten and she got much better. But still every once and a while she would have an episode of horrible gas pains and then would deflate again and be ok. I added back in soy and gluten and no change so i figured it was the dairy. I also had her allergy tested and she was negative on dairy, gluten, soy, egg and nuts.

Then when she was 6 months old we went to Jamaica on a family vacation. It was an all inclusive and each family got their own nanny. Even though I told her about the sensitivity with dairy i caught her giving her ice cream!!! Nothing happened, no gas. So I thought, she was over it. We got back to the states and I added in dairy a little bit, symptoms came back. So all I could figure is that something in the US dairy was making her sick. I tried organic milk. No symptoms. she was fine. Then I tried hormone free dairy (they sell a lot at Trader Joes). No symptoms. I have concluded that she has a sensitivity with rBGH (recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone). The FDA approved it for use in the US around 1993. It is banned in every other country in the world. The use it to increase milk production in cows. Kind of wrong dont' you think?! so we now have her only on either organic dairy or hormone free dairy (oberweis is hormone free). If we slip up she still gets horrible gas and eczema patches. She is now 17 months old.

That is my experience. A friend of mine's daughter also developed breasts as a baby and what ended up making them go away was switching her to organic milk. Her doctor believes she is sensitive to higher levels of hormones as well.

I hope this helps and you find some relief for her. I know how frustrating it is to try and figure this stuff out.

best of luck,
J. (mom of 31/2 year old and 17 mo old girls)