Our Allergen-Free Story

Baby and I were having a check-up with our lactation consultant as he’d had his tongue tie snipped a month earlier. He’d done a poo so I was changing his nappy on the floor when the consultant confirmed my suspicions: “That’s not normal poo”.

 

It was green, mucousy and had these strange fibrous strings in it, like chopped up twine. I had of course Googled ‘Is my baby’s poo normal?’ on numerous occasions but general health information concluded that as long as there wasn’t blood in it, it’s all ok. However, knowing it was different to my first baby’s poo and that baby was often upset, I was keen to see if we could achieve something a little more ‘normal’. Baby had also started developing a few small spots of eczema.

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The lactation consultant advised me to cut out eggs, dairy, nuts and gluten to see if this made a difference. I did this for three weeks, fully breastfeeding baby, but we didn’t see any change. “Try cutting out soy too,” said the lactation consultant. Within a day we had a significantly less green poo.

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We continued to avoid these main food allergens and his poo returned to “normal”. His eczema was a little worse, though I had researched that eczema was rarely caused by food,  but that eczema was common in people that did have food intolerances or allergies.

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During our elimination diet, we were also in the process of moving to a new town. Shortly after arriving into our new house, both baby and my husband’s eczema quickly got much worse. This became the focus of my attention. At this stage, baby was only just starting solids and I still wasn't consuming those five allergens in my diet.

 

The first allergen I slowly re-introduced was eggs. Through my diet only (ie breast milk) it was fine, though on two occasions baby had a massive rash after we had been to the beach then had scrambled eggs for lunch. It took me a while to realise that this was a new rash and not eczema, and further trial-and-error revealed that it was the eggs and not the beach (or our dog that accompanied us).

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After four months in the new house we holidayed in a different city. A few days into it, both baby and husband’s eczema had completely disappeared. We were still on allergen-free diets at this point so we realised it had to be lack of an external trigger.

 

This left me with three strong contenders: chlorine in the water, dust mites, or the dog (as he hadn’t come on holiday with us). I called the councils from our holiday city, our current town and our previous city but the chlorine levels in the town water supplies didn’t match the varying degrees of eczema.

 

So I then researched dust mite allergies. Tips I researched and implemented were hot washing clothes, sheets and towels, purchasing a vacuum cleaner with a HEPA (High-Efficiency Particulate Air) vacuum, and using an anti-allergen probiotic spray (I used PureBiotics NZ). By this stage I had already switched to low-tox living as well, knowing that harsh chemicals can be skin irritants. Amazingly, these anti-dustmite tips and products did the trick and the only time he’s had eczema since was when he crawled into the back of a dusty cupboard. The new house has beautiful thick wool carpet which holds a lot more dust than our previous house, so I now vacuum a lot more too.

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Now, back to the food intolerances… A few months after the egg setback, and baby now eleven months old, I was keen to start reintroducing allergens again. Gluten re-entered our diets without a hitch. Though for the other allergens… every time I tried to bring something else back, baby would develop a fever, a cold and a viral rash — to the point where I felt it wasn’t just a coincidence.

 

I gave it a rest for a few months and then started in with nuts again. This time, it was all ok. Next I tried soy… all ok. After that we tried eggs… all ok. And finally, dairy… not ok (sloppy diarrhea). At 14 months I finished breastfeeding and gave him bottles with either oat milk or soy-based formula. I’d become much more relaxed about our diets and didn’t object to baby having small amounts of dairy every now and then as it didn’t cause him any pain (though it would clear out his bowels within half an hour).

 

However, at 16 months I realised he hadn’t had a single solid poo since I stopped breastfeeding. I replaced all of his milk with rice milk, and within 2 days he had a normal, solid poo.

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This is where we’re at now (toddler at 19 months at the time of writing this), so I’ve learnt that it’s not a linear, straight forward journey. It’s definitely had its challenges. We are waiting for a skin-prick test so hopefully this will give us some insights. I’m grateful that this process has led us to a low-tox, low preservative lifestyle and I’m proud that we conquered baby’s eczema. I’m also proud how long we survived on the elimination diet, and I’d love to share my favourite recipes with you.

 

I wish you all the best for your allergen-free journey and I hope you can get to the bottom of what may be causing a reaction for your little one(s).