Milk Allergy - Intolerance

L.,

Milk issues can present themselves in the following ways:

Loose stools (possibly containing blood), vomiting, gagging, refusing food, irritability or colic, and skin rashes. Most children will outgrow this form of allergy by 2 years of age.

Also, irritability, vomiting, wheezing, swelling, hives, other itchy bumps on the skin, and bloody diarrhea can occur within a short period of time after consuming milk.

Remember, animal milk is not a necessary part of the human diet. Try using other foods for their calcium needs if that's your reason for wanting to include milk into their diet.

Here is an AWESOME list of non dairy sources of calcium:
http://www.healthatoz.com/healthatoz/Atoz/common/standard...

While I realize your original question was not one about dairy alternatives, I wanted to show you that you do not need to include dairy in your child's diet just because.

Best of luck.

I had my son on Nutramigen as well when he was around 4 weeks old because of constant crying and bad skin and constipation. Nutramigen still has milk in it, it is just broken down- so if he was okay on that- he may be able to tolerate broken down forms of it. I just know from my little boy who is now 1 1/2 that he had to be on Neocate because he could not tolerate it at all and then he was put on Rice Milk at age 15 months. There are many ways to get your child calcium without giving him milk- and in my boys life- without giving him any dairy at all!!!! Email me if you have any questions :)

Both of my sons just had a baby and both had issues with milk. The oldest had to be put on breast milk and when she tried to start the weaning process he developed a cold and other health issues so the doctor told her he can't come off breast milk until he is 1 years old and developed a stronger immu system. The other 5 weeks had to have her mild changed due to her spitting up all the time and severe gas. Presently she had be diagnosed with acid reflux, at the tender age, due to the mile she was on, they changed her milk and put her on medication for babys with this issue. Some of the things she was doing to show this, spitting milk up all the time, stomach cramps, hard stools, etc. My youngest son had to drink soy milk before he even came out of the hospital, due to the same situations. You might want to try some baby foods that you know will soften his/her stool first to see if this help. Good luck. Poor baby have to go through these issues just for coming out of the womb.smile.

Take a couple drops of milk and put it on the inside of his elbow as well as the side of his face (between the eye and ear). Leave it on for a minute or so. If the child has any reaction (inflamation, hives ect) at the sites it is likely an allergy to one of the cow's milk proteins.

My son is allergic to the whey protein. My wife still nurses him so he gets his calcium there. If your son is allergic or you find that he is lactose intolerant you can get good quality calcium from goat's milk (more people drink goats milk than cows milk worldwide). Soy is not a source of calcium, it needs to be fortified with calcium, so rather than deal with the hormonal fallout of it you could just add crushed calcium tablets to your son's juice, water or food - thats all they do to soy juice anyway.

Hi. The PP was an excellent response. I had a milk allergy when I was a baby, which I outgrew but then I clearly remember as a child if I consumed too much - like a large bowl of ice cream - horrible stomach pain. When my daughter was born last year, I knew that she was allergic to milk because I nursed her and on the days I ate dairy, she projectile vomited. So, we are not going to give her any cow milk for a few years. The allergy is to the cow milk protein casein. Please remember that the allergy comes with a great deal of discomfort, in my opinion it's best not to take any chances. There are plenty of soy, goat, and rice alternatives. Good luck!

It can be very difficult to tell. With both of my boys, we did a trial run of dairy free for either diarhea or ear infections, but neither seemed to help.

I would caution about soy -- although at one, he might be ok. My little guy was on soy formula for six months, and then belatedly I found out that it coudl actually have been contributing to his diarrhea problem. GRRRR! Sucks.

Ask to see an allergist or nutritionist. My experience has been that the PCP is not the best resource for this question.