New to this board, but questions about MSPI dairy allergy, failure to thrive, feeding issues, etc...
My son is almost 8 months old now and has had feeding issues since birth. He was born full term and was a whopping 10lbs at birth, 98th %ile. He has since fallen down in the low teens and is considered "failure to thrive" since he has not gained (and actually has lost a little) weight since he was 5 months old. He was a colicky baby and 2 weeks prior to his 2 month appointment we started him on Axid for reflux. Didn't help. At his 2 month appt the pedi suggested I pump for 2 weeks and give him just Alimentum to see if it helps. It did. New baby. However, he kept slowly dropping in weight and at 5 months he just stopped gaining. At first it was attributed to his double ear infection with ruptured ear drums, but it continued. Put on prevacid at 6 months. No help. Now he is 8 months and although is not 'nutritionally at risk' as the GI puts it is definitely not thriving as he should. A week ago he began vomitting and refusing to eat, doctor attributed it to a stomach virus that is "going around". Hospitalized for dehydration. Still vomits from time to time although its improved, but still is only eating 8-10oz/day. Flat out refusing to eat most of the time. They upped his prevacid dosage and if that doesn't work we will switch to Neocate or Elecare. The GI is almost certain he has an allergy not an intolerance because we tried Whey protien in his solids (per the nutritionist to boost calories) and his mouth swelled up something crazy.
We have an appointment with a speech/feeding therapist set up for Tuesday. Allergist next week. I am just concerned that it is not a bug and its all related to a bigger issue. I am thinking we probably need to just switch to the Neocate now because maybe its that. He just keeps dropping in weight and I cannot get him to eat. Sometimes if even a touch of formula from his bottle drips in his mouth he will gag and vomit.
He has seen 2 GI's for this...he has also seen a Neurologist because he has an assymmetrical crying face and had an ECHO done for that and it was normal. Developmentally he is on track, smiles and laughs, sits up on his own, rolls, can get on hands and knees and rock but no crawling...etc...
I am just worried that he keeps losing and I cannot get him to eat more and I know he needs it. Anyone have any experience with this? I know they are trying to do all the non-invasive stuff before they do an endo or anything more invasive...but I am just so worried. Sorry if I am babbling. Any help or similar stories with outcomes will help. Thanks
Re: New to this board, but questions about MSPI dairy allergy, failure to thrive, feeding issues, etc...
I might be wrong, but I think prevacid actually has dairy in its binder, so you may want to discuss that with your GI.
DD1 had a severe dairy allergy and it was horrible. She wasn't real big to start with, around the 50% and fell below the 5th before we finally were able to start putting weight on her. She did alimentum that was thickened with rice cereal and once we finally were able to see a GI they switched us to zantac and off the prevacid. She was not a fan of solid foods and didn't eat much at all. Eventually we went to a spreadsheet to keep track of how much she was eating and how much she was spitting up. We did mix in powder formula to her pureed foods, but she flat out refused to eat baby food (she was also on seizure meds that were mixed in and gave the food a bitter taste).
At 5 she weights 36 lbs and is 42" tall, so she's pretty small. In fact our bus driver was positive she was a preschool, not a kindergartener because of her size. Let me know if you need anything. We've been where you are, as have other moms on this board, and hopefully you can get some answers soon.
Our GI did a full scratch test on DD1 for food allergies and we got some surprising results--including beef. Apparently some dairy allergy kids also react to beef.
From what I understand, only the very severe dairy allergies have issues with the prevacid. I know we did, but our GI was pretty good and stayed on top of things. In fact when DD1 needed to try a new laxative at age 3.5 he wouldn't do it until her scratch test came back negative for a dairy allergy because the new laxative had lactose in it.
And yes, she outgrew the dairy allergy around age 3. The soy was outgrown by age 1 and my younger daughter has outgrown her crazy food allergies (carrots, peas, green beans and rice) in the last year--she's 3.5.
We switched to Good Start Soy at age 1 because she was over the soy allergy and our GI wanted us to try a regular formula. We tried several before we discovered that some companies package dairy and soy formulas on the same lines so there can be cross contamination (that's how severe the allergy was). Good Start uses dedicated dairy free lines for their soy and because its partially broken down already it was easier for her tummy to digest.
She is no longer allergic to dairy, but really doesn't like it. She used rice milk until DD2 was about 6 months old and we discovered that she had a rice allergy. Around that time the GI had us start Bright Beginnings Soy (like pediasure, but dairy free).
Oh, and DD1 stayed on formula until she was almost 2. It was her primary nutrition due to feeding aversions. She came off the zantac around 2.5 but still has textural aversions to food.
I'll be back on later if you have more questions. Time to get DD1 off the bus and then go to speech therapy.