dd has a dairy allergy - Page 2

[lil_miss_understood]

Originally Posted by lnitti

She just tested positive via the skin test to dairy. Her allergist said 80% of kids will outgrow a dairy allergy by age 5. He said we would check her again in a year to see if she still has the allergy.

Also, he told me that actual experience with food is more accurate than any allergy testing. If there are foods containing dairy that she eats and does not react to, then she should be ok to continue eating those foods.

He also wrote a prescription for an epi-pen. <snip> I'm not expecting that we would need to ever use it as any reactions she had had so far have been very minor.

Okay, regarding all of this, particularly with further knowledge of your dd's history... ProudAmerican and txtarheel will be a much better person to answer this than me, since I believe her dc's allergies are ana (anaphylactic- ana's the abbreviation around here... we still need the abbreviations thread stickied... anyway...). BUT my 2 cents...
The fact that she reacted via skin is concerning and I seriously doubt he just hands out epi-pens like candy to anyone with a positive reaction. DS1 has an IgE dairy allergy as well and I'm *still* fighting to try to get an epi-pen for him. He's older than your dd now and had hives when younger that were shrugged off as "heat rash", along with one very scary incident when he was a baby- he went pale, limp and lethargic with shallow breathing and a slow heart rate- which the nurse told me I was "overreacting- a common thing amongst first time mothers" and not to bother wasting the ER staff's time by bringing him in and then hung up on me (I had been trying to get her to send an ambulance since I had no transportation and it was a 40 minute walk in -45 degree weather). He's starting to react to smaller and smaller amounts of dairy. He never used to react to things labeled "made in the same facility as" or "made on equipment shared with", but I suspect they are the root of his seeming dairy reactions recently (behavioral, bed wetting, excessive thirst).
I would *not* consider your dd's latest reaction minor. I would class it as serious.

but then I found at 1 of my local stores a non-dairy rice crust cheese pizza.

This is what we buy for ds1, then we add whatever he wants to it- pepperoni, mushrooms, olive, whatever.
Also, be aware that caramel coloring (often used on french fries) can be from a dairy source.

[Therese's Mommy]

Originally Posted by txtarheel

The Amy's brand makes a dairy free pizza. It's cheese free, the sauce is balsamic carmelized onions. It's a really tasty pizza. It's not the same as delivery, but it's a quick, easy dinner. Be warned, their soy cheese pizza has casein in it, which is the protein that most milk allergic kids react to. Several brands of soy cheeses also have casein and whey.

Thanks for the info about Amy's pizza. I was unaware of it's existence. My dd#2 has allergies to wheat and dairy (among other things). I am glad to know that there is a pizza alternative for her as I always make pizza on Friday nights (she is too young to feel left out on the pizza fun). If you go to the Amy's website they list exactly which things are dairy free, gluten free, etc. That soy cheese pizza is not listed as dairy free, so perhaps the website is a great place to start to find which pizzas are safe and which are not.

Beth

[lnitti]

Originally Posted by JacquelineR

I would *not* consider your dd's latest reaction minor. I would class it as serious.

Yes I do agree, I was shocked when I got to After Hours and saw her. I've never seen anything like it. However, we don't know what caused it. My personal thoughts are that her immune system was compromised by the cold she had been battling, and the double ear infection she developed, and that coupled with either the different shampoo/lotion and maybe some hidden dairy in something - She did not have dairy outright, but I know more than likely it was in something she ate. i swear her belly looked like the pictures of ethiopian babies. The doctor asked me if she was constipated, but she wasn't. She didn't believe me and showed me how to massage her belly and bicycle her legs But I think she was swollen from the hives. Ones that benadryl injection took effect, her belly was no longer swollen.

[lnitti]

This weekend, I sorted through our pantry and our areas of "overstock" of dry non refrigerated or frozen foods to identify and sort dairy containing products out. Every think containing dairy has been separated and labeled with masking tape.

I did the same with all refrigerated foods - including all left overs. We have two fridge/freezer combos and a stand alone freezer. I made it through the 2 freezers attached to the fridge, and started a little on the stand alone freezer.

My husband know that he need to eat the stuff marked "dairy" and that I won't be preparing them for dinner for the rest of the family. Due to schedules, my dh does not usually eat with us anyways. On the weekends it is usually after we've eaten, but during the week, he's not home. Also, now he knows what items he can give dd and what items he can't.

So I plan to only cook dairy-free for the most part. I will be cooking some of the other stuff so that he has leftovers to eat. but it will be cooked, then stored away in the fridge for him and not served to the rest of us.

The only exception - I'm not sure yet what to do with the frozen pizza and Annie's Mac n Cheese that odd eats. I will either give them away or make her that when I make something different for ydd - until they are gone.

The frozen sauces and such, I will just thaw for dh, and he can have them with his rice/pasta/noodles, etc when he normally eats left overs (after he gets home from work, etc).

I've already bought a bunch of dairy-free stuff for us to try before I start stocking up an anything. Make sure we like it first before stocking up.

[Ruthla]

How about getting the tofutti pizza for the toddler to eat while the older one eats the dairy frozen pizza you already have in the house?

I'm not sure about a true "mac n cheese substitute"- will the little one be happy with plain macaroni (maybe with margarine melted in) while her big sister eats mac n cheese?

For the non-dairy ice creams, I was thinking that maybe you'd give the older one dairy ice cream while the little one gets rice or soy ice cream, so they both have "ice cream" at the same time even if it's from different containers. It's fine if the little one hasn't been introduced to ice cream yet, and is OK with not eating it when her sister does, but I doubt that will work forever- eventually she'll want ice cream too.

[FireWithin]

Whenever we need to remove a new food for ds2, I try to observe a transition period where I don't serve that food in front of h. This ds1 started eating eggs at lunch time during ds2s nap. It would be very difficult to remove all of his allergen foods from the house, but I work hard on alternatives and infrequency. I need to follow ds2s diet. From my own experience, I know how much it hurts to be excluded from too many foods and experiences.

So for us we do a combo of equivalents (rice milk rather than cow milk) or removal from sight (for 4 months.no one ate eggs in front of my youngest, it just felt too cruel.). For a while my oldest would snack on apples in another room (it used to be a favorite food of my youngest) but now we have created pears as the equivalent.

Fwiw. We can make a tasty mac and cheese with nutritional yeast. Just a safe milk, safe "butter", salt, nutritional yeast, and a dash of garlic powder.

Good luck.
The mamas here are very good about thinking of subs

[lil_miss_understood]

Also, he told me that actual experience with food is more accurate than any allergy testing. If there are foods containing dairy that she eats and does not react to, then she should be ok to continue eating those foods.

Intended to address this but forgot.
While it is true that actual experience with food is more accurate than allergy testing, in the case of an anaphylactic allergy (which it sounds like your daughter is developing into if it isn't already), past experience with a food is no indicator for how bad a reaction will be. It can suddenly become much MUCH worse than anything you have dealt with previously.

[lnitti]

mac and chreese

We found this Mac and chreese:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000LKZEO6

I added extra rice milk and extra earths balance to make it creamier. We actually did the 123's version and it was acceptable to me and to ydd. Odd initially said it was good, then said she didn't like it. So we'll see. it is cheaper through amazon, so I bought some. But this time the elbows instead of the numbers - hopefully easier for ydd to use her silverware than the tiny 123's.