Does this sound like a Food Allergy?
saram913
member
We started DD on Gerber rice cereal at 4 months and she did fine with it. Last Friday we tried Gerber Oatmeal cereal. Saturday I notice that she was having an increase in poopy diapers and they also seemed watery. Sunday it seemed like we were changing poopy diapers back to back. She was also crying alot. DD never cries only fusses, and I could tell her tummy was hurting her. She was also gassy. I put it together that maybe the oatmeal was upsetting her tummy, so we decided that we would stop feeding her it. She only ate it Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.
Monday the water diapers continued. Monday night she started breaking out into what seemed like a rash around 6:30. It would come and go so I was trying to hold off until the next day to so we could see our pedi. By 10pm the rash was all over her body and looked awful so we decided to go the ER. The ER doctor said that it was hives and she was having an reaction to something. Since we weren't using any new soaps or anything, he agreed that it was probably something in the oatmeal. He said to give her benadryl every four hours, try the oatmeal later and if she reacted again we would need to do allergy test for foods.
The hives took about 2 days to completely go away. The poopy watery diapers are still tapering off but seem to be getting better.
My questions are 1. does it sound like a food allergy? I have never dealt with anything like this before and have no idea. 2. If it is an allergy how long would it take to get out of her system?
Thank you so much or reading all of this!
Re: Does this sound like a Food Allergy?
when we were still introducing new foods- if we noticed any kind of reaction (unless it would be very severe- like breathing issues) we were told to pull the food for 2 weeks and then reintroduce. If you get a reaction again- probably an allergy. There's a chance that it's something else she ate/a virus/something environmental and not the oatmeal. If you pull it for 2 weeks and try agian you'll know for sure.
I'd also switch to an organic brand rather than Gerber or make your own from gluten free oats (you just grind them up in the food processor). Lots of the baby oatmeal has wheat in it- you can't avoid the cross contamination completely. The less processed the oats are the lower your chances are for cross contamination. My son is wheat allergic and couldn't handle any of the baby oatmeal. We bought steel cut oats and I ground them myself and we never had any other issues.
My daughter was diagnosed with an oat allergy at about 6 months, and this sounds a lot like her reaction. She had digestive issues (tons of poopy diapers, eventually w/blood), eczema rashes, and hives. It took a few weeks to convince the doctors that the oatmeal might be the culprit, but when she was tested for allergies, it came up positive for oats.
It took about 2 weeks for it to completely clear out of her system once she was diagnosed, but there was a major difference once it was. I would definitely hold off on the oatmeal if I were you, and discuss allergy testing with your regular doctor.
Something to keep in mind if you do think it's an oat allergy- a lot of skin products have oats in them (Aveeno, etc.), and those cause her to react as well. Not sure if it would for everyone, but it might be better to be safe than sorry.
So, my husband and I felt so dumb. My daughter was diagnosed with an oat allergy at 9 months old (she is now 18 months). Her blood test was an 8 back in September. We just realized that we have been using Aveeno with oats in it for her eczema this whole time. It hasn't done anything to her (her skin is just fine) in the last nine months, so we will keep using it, but we felt real SMRT when we realized that just last week.