Breastfeeding a dairy intollerent baby

[emmaporter]

Hi,

I'm new here and have just posted a hello in the introductions forum.

I am a breastfeeding mother of a ten month old boy who developed an itchy rash on his torso after a virus. The rash continued to worsen, so that the skin on his back and tummy was red, papery dry, and very very itchy.

After food sensitivity testing flagged up cow's milk as a problem, we both went dairy free, which has helped immensely - his skin is now clear so long as we keep to the rules, and I've lost five pounds! Now though, the health visitor has suggested that soya is not so good for little boys, and we're a bit stuck!

Any tips and suggestions of ways to keep mummy sane and baby itch free would be greatly appreciated!

[rebecca c]

I weaned my eldest on to Soya and hope I dont regret it in the future. There are other milk alternatives for you to drink out there. I prefer rice milk fortified with calcium. Try to get a list of foods with calcium in-maybe see a dietician, although we have found them to be of variable quality.

definitely brown bread and green leafy veg.

[Lou C]

Hi and welcome, I think the key is everything in moderation, what your health visitor is saying has not been proven (that I know of anyway) but I believe there has been some suggestion as to the phytooestrogens (the plant hormones which are similar to the female hormone oestrogen) causing problems for males in later life. I'm sure you could do a search and find out for yourself........Unfortunately health profesionals can't know everything about everything so if they read something they aren't necessarily going to do the research to be able to back it up, which I think may be the case here.
My son is 15 months now and has been on soya since about 8 months. I try to rotate different milks, so I'll get a carton of soya milk, a carton of oat milk then a carton of rice milk. Another reason for this being I don't want him to develop a soya intolerance. I get the Milks which have added vitamins and are calcium fortified.
I hope that helps, I'm sure others will know more than me!!! But please don't worry, and go with what YOU think!
Lou xx

[Ruth]

I breastfed a baby with dairy and soya intolerance for several months and also had to stick to the same diet...I just used rice milk and pure sunflower for everything..I also lost a heap of weight because of it and became quite ill (if you don't keep the calorie intake up you will suffer not your baby). By then Cate was 14 months so her consultant suggested strongly that it was time to put her on a special prescription only formula which is still working well.

The dietician prescribed me calcium and vitamin D tablets to protect my own bones...it might we worth asking about that....

[bella]

Hi Emma.
I have a 3 1/2 year old boy who has galactosaemia. He is on a strict lactose free diet for life. From 11 days old he was on Pregestamil & then onto Infasoy. After that, at about 1 year old, we started giving him the soya alternatives like Provamel & now he has Granose.
We asked his dietician about soya causing infertility & about becoming soya intolerant. We were told that at the time, 3 years ago, there was no proof of soya causing any of the above. I am not sure if that has changed since.