Elimination diet confusion....

[snappfamily]

Hi all,

I'm so glad I've found this forum!!!  My exclusively breastfed son is 4 months old, and has reflux and blood in his stool.  I have been on various elimination diets for the past 8 weeks.  I started out eliminating dairy, soy, eggs, and fish (including ALL hidden sources!)  When he didn't improve, I removed citrus and all nuts.  He still didn't improve, so then I went on Dr. Sears total elimination diet, and only ate turkey, rice, potatoes, squash, and pears.  I was sooo tired all the time and losing too much weight, so I started adding things back in.  My diet now consists  of the Dr. Sears foods plus beef, wheat, lettuce, cucumbers, oats and avocados.  He'll go for about 3 days with no blood, and then it comes back again.  I can't get him to go any longer than 3 days without any blood.  He's gaining tons of weight,(he's in the 86th percentile!!) he's always happy, and thriving wonderfully.  He occasionally has tiny spots of eczema on his skin, which is the only other sign that he may be dealing with food allergies. 

I keep a rigorous food diary, as well as charting his poops.  I can't seem to find any correlation with wheat.   I've noticed that he has blood about 50% of the time after I've eaten beef, and 50% of the time after I've eaten corn syrup (by accident!!).  I just can't seem to figure out what he's reacting to!!   

Something that continues to cross my mind is this:  It took him 2 months of drinking my breastmilk (his first two months of life) before he started having blood in his stool.  So, it must take a while to build up in his system and get his system mad enough to start bleeding.  Therefore, when doing an elimination diet and charting your foods.....how can you truly know what the triggers are?  For example.....maybe his blood is showing up from the beef, but it doesn't build up bad enough to start bleeding until I've been eating it for 3 weeks.  Does that make sense?  In other words, if I introduce a new food, and wait 4-7 days to see if he has a reaction.....what if he doesn't have a reaction until 2 weeks of me eating the food.  Then how I can I truly figure out what he's reaction to?

Thanks in advance for any advice or suggestions.  I am SOOOOOOOOOOOOO frustrated and don't know what else to do!

Thanks!
Any ideas or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!! 

[deb]

Totally random reactions, typing fast since I have to go shortly:

My first thought with blood in stool is wheat.

It takes up to 3 weeks for food proteins to clear the body; 2 weeks is usually enough to see a difference.

If the Sears diet was causing you to lose too much weight too fast, you might be able to add in millet for another grain, plus good fats like coconut oil and olive oil for additional calories (and avocados for more good fat - we used to add olive oil and/or flaxseed oil to guacamole back in the day! . How was your DS when you did this diet?

[anielasmommy]

i would think wheat too he seems to be having  bucket reaction. have you done allergy testing? i think beef is very dangerous too...have you eliminated corn? thats a big one as well.
i would try adding chicken or pork instead of the beef. i would go gluten free and eliminate the corn.
i am so with you btw we are wheat/gluten, dairy, soy, corn, fish/shellfish, beef, nuts, seeds, and tomato free...so far haha

[snappfamily]

Wow, thanks to both of you for responding!   I've stayed on the wheat and beef, but cut out all corn products, and he hasn't had any blood in his diapers for about 2 weeks, now!  YIPPEE!!!!!  But I've recently started adding things a bit quickly, and I don't know if he's doing ok with them.  For example, he's refluxing worse, and has a little eczema spot on his face.  ARgh! 

Anielasmommy-what did you mean by "bucket reaction"? 

[EloysH]

you'll need to be on the look out for salicyalte sensitivity, amines, and glutamates.  You can read up about them on the link below.  But basically if you eat alot of foods that are high in these natural food chemicals you will get a food intolerance reaction like mucus i the stool or blood in stools, unsettledness, rashes etc.

http://www.sswahs.nsw.gov.au/rpa/allergy/

corn and avocados are very high in salicylayes
Turkey is high in amines,  The way you cook any meats adds amines for exacmple BBQ'ing, slow cooking, charring, and eating left overs that are not cooked that day.

[EloysH]

Food intolerance reactions can take days or weeks to build up, often the last food before the reaction gets blamed, where as its a build of things from a particular group.   That's why the introduction of foods in a controlled way is very important, considering the individual food as well as the group that it represents.

When I went gluten/dairy/soy/egg/preservative & additive/  free I found that I increased my salicylates and amines considerably over time, as my diet became more and more restricted in other areas.  I had been on the diet for 2 months and then DS2 started showing mucus in his poos again. I could not place where they were coming from it seemed random - after porkbelly, sasuages or avocados and corn chips.  I now realise that it was a probably a build of amines or sals.     I cut my losses 3 weeks ago and started the Royal Prince Alfred Elimination diet, which accounts for allergy foods as well as sals, glutamates, preservatives, additives, amines.  I am yet to do the first food chalenge yet though.

[anielasmommy]

pp explained it well. its like if i eat corn for 4 days but 3 days later she has a reaction...it happens.

i know we are not attempting any new introductions until shes 1 y/o. then we will take it very slow. DDs GI specialist said most babies do not "get over" intolerances until at least 1 y/o.