Dairy and constipation - any experience?

[Edesanja]

Eloise, I haven't tried that recipe yet - I ended up using the coconut oil as I couldn't go out to get rice bran oil (I have now though and we'll make some more later today). It turned out quite hard with coconut oil, but it's YUM!

Wow, very interesting Alex (and Eloise, as usual!). E seems to still be pooing ok (and a big benefit so far is that it's not at 615/630 in the morning so she gets the extra sleep she needs) but it's a bit early to tell yet what the verdict will be overall. She coped fine at the PIL's for dinner on Monday - it's often a bit of a dairy-fest but it was a roast and FIL left butter and milk out of her mashed potato and we took her own container of ice cream.

Oh that reminds me, this week they started the milk in schools programme. I opted out, and E was a bit worried to be the only person who didn't get to drink milk, but I said there were likely to be others that couldn't eat dairy in her calss. Turns out there is another little girl who is allergic/intolerant to dairy and E asked her if her mum made her special ice cream too. She was really proud that we had made her ice cream and glad that she had something *special* in common with this girl!

[*Becky*]

Hi Jenny,
I just wanted to say we are going through the same thing with DS who is 4.5. We are on movicol once a day but the consultant wants us to go completely dairy free for a month. We started yday and tomorrow I am going to go out and get a few bits. It is cheese I will struggle with tbh as my boy loves cheese! He has been partially dairy free for a year and is so good about it, he will ask me if foods have dairy in them now bless him. Does your DD soil or is is more of the traditional pattern of not going for days?

[Edesanja]

Hi Becky, good luck with it! I think we can say that dairy free has made a different now after 20 days but we will still do a challenge. It was pretty quick actually to get back to 'normal' poo for her, but then she wasn't still all clogged up - we'd flushed out all the old poo already and the lactulose was just keeping things moving. I'd be interested to know how long it takes to show a difference to you guys.

E has encopresis which is why it took us so long to figure out what the problem was. It always appeared to be diahorrea that she had, not constipation, but it's in fact overflow  . She was pooing 3 times a day still. She did start soiling a tiny bit when it was at it's worst (before that it was just wetting from her bowel pushing on her bladder) and that's how we eventually figured out what the problem was.

Lovely topic this!

ps I did find some quite interesting medical journal articles about dairy and constipation if anyone is interested?

[ENMS]

ps I did find some quite interesting medical journal articles about dairy and constipation if anyone is interested?

Definitely interested!

Glad to hear things are going well.

[draxela]

Yeah I'd be interested in the medical journal articles please! My GP is really irritating me. He keeps banging on about how it's really just lactose and how it's fine to give her cheese and butter, despite the paediatrician's diagnosis of cow's milk PROTEIN allergy. Gah!

I totally agree re: missing cheese.  How are you supposed to get vegetables into a toddler without cheese!? Sigh.

We had encopresis too.  Very annoying to find out that's what it was.  The Movicol is great, but it masks the true problems unfortunately.

[ZacsMumme]

If not intolerant to soy...could thy this for those veges Drax http://dairyfreecooking.about.com/od/dessertsbeverages/r/MildCheeseSce.htm

Also interested in the articles Jenny
Great your seeing progress!

[*Becky*]

that is exactly the same as for us Jenny. Henry would go up to 5 times a day. I am not convinced dairy is an issue actually but we will def give this a good go. Glad to hear things have improved for you.

[Edesanja]

I hope I haven't spoken too soon.... she had harder, darker poo tonight, but she did have chocolate cake today and I know chocolate doesn't sit that well with her. But it made me go "Eek, I hope this isn't old poo!" Hopefully it's just the chocolate, anyway. Ugh, I wish I could be certain though!

Here are some of the articles I found:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/11846872/
http://journals.lww.com/jpgn/Fulltext/2004/06001/p0471_chronic_contipation_secondary_to_cow_s_milk.595.aspx
http://pediatrics.jwatch.org/cgi/content/full/2010/721/1
http://brittneyholloway98.tripod.com/mpa.html

[EloysH]

Great that you used coconut oil for the ice-cream. Way better option - the rice bran oil is damaged trans fat 

I think the main thing with diet change is just the getting your head around it more than anything. I have found so many amazing an inspirational blogs where the recipes and foods cooked there look and taste great and are using very restricted ingredients. Main thing is getting out of the mode of instant foods and cooking from scratch. I am sure a lot of the girls round here do anyway.  And now  I guess you are going to ask for those great blogs 

Quirky cooking is one of my faves 

Paleo blogs seem to be really great as they are all dairy free....

I honestly don't miss cheese anymore but I am not sure what I would do without butter.....

Kids who like eating veges with cheese might like ghee, many very sensitive to dairy proteins can tolerate it, and steamed veges taste lovely and sweet with some ghee on top, not to mention the fatty acids in the ghee will help the vitamins in the veges be absorbed sand translated more readily by the body. Definantly a good idea to eat veges with a saturated fat. 

As for the DH's just steam roll them   

[Edesanja]

Great that you used coconut oil for the ice-cream. Way better option - the rice bran oil is damaged trans fat 

It was delicious with the coconut oil, but the texture wasn't all nice and creamy.


Dairy free has DEFINITELY helped E, but now I'm doubting myself whether she was/is all clear. We had really sloppy poo this morning. Coming after yesterday's harder dark poo it seems suspicious. But he DID have chocolate cake. Ugh, not sure what if anything we should do now. Lots of prunes for a few days? (and definitely no more chocolate!)

[ZacsMumme]

Sorry OT here but Jenny did you get the coconut oil from the supermarket or elsewhere. Seen it in pak n save but it's pricey!

[Edesanja]

I used to get it from Piko wholefoods but they stopped stocking the one I was getting and the others were quite $$. This time I got it off TM, but I've heard great stuff about blue coconut - it's made in Chch and they do 3l tubs for about $45 I think (much better than $10 for 400g!)

[ZacsMumme]

Ohh thanks. I'm off to google. T can now have coconut oil amongst other things

[mickstillman]

Has anyone experienced congestion/cough/respiratory problems as a reaction to milk based formula? 5.5 mo old recently switched to milk based Gerber from nutramigen and has been sick for a month with no improvement in symptoms. I'm not sure if she just has environmental allergies or a long lasting cold.  But started to wonder about a milk allergy??

[EloysH]

Yes congestion can be a sign of milk protein intolerance.

Jenny, how is she now, I was going to say wait for a few days if bad poos that should give you a clearer view.