At what point is mucous poo a true intolerance/allergy?

[kitty30]

This one puzzles me.  DD2 poops have always been slightly mucousy.  She was breast fed for 5 months and has been FF since now 7 months.  Her poops regularly are a little stringy which I assume is mucous.  She is a windy baby still but mostly top wind her bottom wind is not too bad and certainly does not bother her.  Her skin is dry but but regular moisturising has resolved this.  Generally she is a happy babe.

She has started solids but really only root veg/fruit/chicken/turkey.  

So I am guessing if she has any sensitivity it must be the dairy in her formula.  Being that she is generally happy should I continue as am.  I do not want to exclude dairy from her diet unnecessarily or should I be reading more into the mucous.

Of note her bowel movements have had a definite change in the last couple of days...very loose and frequent with strings.  The only new food trialled was oats so I have removed them for now.  Not certain if it is a tummy bug or possible gluten reaction.

Any ideas.

[EloysH]

It really depends on what level of straying from normal you are content to put up with for her. There are so many shades of intolerance, they can be slightly intolerant or severly intolerant.  Many can live with a mild case without changing anything.  It sounds as though she may be fine to continue since she is happy and settled.  

 The advice I have been given is to consider the whole picture of poos and settledness, wind, tummy pain etc to form a whole picture if you really think they are suffering or not.   I do know there is no long term damage done to the gut, it will heal once the irrtitants are out or they start to tolerate the irritants with time.    But I also do know that if they could have no persistent mucus they would be even better health wise. For my Ds2, if his poos are mucusy then he is quite unsettled with that, he will poo very frequently and at strange times of the night distrupting his sleep, so I know that I need to change something to make the mucus go away.

 Another factor to consider is whether it is feasible that her formula could be switched to a broken down dairy based formula and whether she will drink something else.

[OFIH]

I agree with the possible change the doctor could aid you with in regards to formula. No mucous would be best. But before extensive testing is done, I would really talk with your doctor about simple things that might take care of the situation. They can even do some stool sampling for certain issues. That would be extremely easy. Hoping you find what is right for your little one.

[~*~Louisa~*~]

I would keep an eye on it, DD#2 always had a few poo issues but at about 6 months it got worse and worse, she went from being pretty much fine with just some funky poop to weight issues, bad skin issues, and the poop was ending up burning her skin the poor thing

so it can change but tbh you would have issues with a dr or anyone if she is fine and happy, Sophina was lucky because she had weight issues, and Alyssa started being fobbed off untill her weight got effected too, i know a woman who had to fight because her daughter was thriving

so if your happy, and she is happy personally i would monitor, some grow out of it by a year anyway so if she is happy she could of grown out it in 3 months anyway

[OFIH]

A bit off topic, but on the burning the skin issue...my younger son had that and it would get so bad it would become infected. His old pediatrician couldn't figure out why he had a strep infection on his rear end all the time causing the burning that would peel his little skin until it bled. Our new pediatrician saw it differently. He had stomach acid in his poop that was burning his skin, thus opening it up for infection. Not only did she help us figure out his tummy problems to stop that, but gave us a tip to get rid of the burned sore. I couldn't believe it worked, but thought I might pass it on in case it helps others.

We did two things when he would get the sore:

1) Take one regular strength Tums (no other type of antacid, no flavoring, and no maximum strength) and crush it into a powder (this is easily done with the back of a spoon after breaking into a few pieces and putting them in a bowl). Put that powder into a nice diaper rash cream like Budreaux's Butt Paste (no ointments). Mix it together and apply very liberally. We made enough for one change each time which uses an entire Tums. - The antacid works to take care of the acid coming in their poop. Made total sense once she said it. It was a duh moment.  The Budreaux's just carried the medicine to the sores and made it stay put. That's why you want a good, thick, paste.

2) Every other diaper change do the above mixture. On the opposite changes, slather on Calmoseptine. This is used to protect the skin around the opening for people who have colostomies and such. Works awesome. Protects against the acid burning in the first place. You might have to ask your pharmacist for this (they usually have it behind the counter or can order it). It's not very expensive.

Do this until the sores disappear.

[~*~Louisa~*~]

I'll remeber that we have been using metonium (sp) and bepanthem after a bout of burning poo, but it takes a while to sort it and with weaning i have no doubt we will have a few burnt bums

[kitty30]

Thanks guys.  I do think it s something to monitor and in my opinion it does seem to be getting worse. 

Louisa if you don't mind me asking was it weight loss/or lack of gaining weight that identified the problem and was it MPI.  I really just feel so over-whelmed right now.  We have battled through reflux.  We struggle to even get 20oz a day into her in 24 hrs, and as for solids well thats just not going well.  If I have to throw in MPI as well im not sure what she will be left eating.  Oh and we spent am in X-ray to ascertain if she has congenital hip disorder!!!!  Sorry for rant.

Just wondering also did your los weight gain subsequently improve??? 

Thanks again.

[~*~Louisa~*~]

The thing that identified it for dd#2 actually was her skin, she has very bad excema and then the poo and finally the weight issues were what had us listened to.

dd#3 it was mucous and screaming in pain which tipped us off.

With DD#2 as soon as we stopped dairy it sorted it,

dd#3 its alot more complicated she is intollerent to most everything and only when we put her on hypoallergenic formula and stopped me feeding she started gaining, the dietion thinks it because she is now totally allergin free

We are not weaning yet but i know the feeling for you, I have the task of weaning dairy, soy, wheat, egg free while on low salycilates and im stuck thinking well what will she eat

But if she has intollerence, it can make reflux alot worse! it can also cause feeding aversions where she might not want to eat anything because it hurts her

I would speak to your GP and try and get a script for a hypoallergenic milk, I think at this age you will probabaly want to request Aptimal pepti because she will pprobabaly refuse nutramigen

and just cut milk out if you would use milk in a meal you can either use the hypo formula or rice/oat milk (formulas better but if your going to be eaing it too rice/oat milk would be fine)