Hi everyone -
My son Ben is almost 6 months old (3/22). We gave him rice cereal for the first time last weekend. We gave 1 tbsp cereal with 2oz breastmilk. He seemed to like it quite a bit and ate all of it happily. I put him down for a nap and when he woke up he had BRIGHT red eyebrows! They were uneven splotches but not raised or bumpy and they didn't not appear to itch or bother him. He was very happy. They stayed very red all afternoon and were even still pink the next morning. It has been 9 days since we fed him and we are really worried to try the rice cereal again because I have heard the second time a reaction will be much worse. Since he is not even 6 mos yet I am planning to wait a bit to feed him solids again.
His ped recommended starting him a couple of weeks early because he sleeps terribly (I know it's a wive's tale that they will sleep better, but we tried it anyway because i'm v.sleep deprived! ). When I called to tell them about the red eyebrows they just said to try again but have some Benadryl on hand
My husband is allergic to a lot of things, which is why we are hesitant to feed him again. He is allergic to: shellfish, some nuts, eggs, tomatoes, celery, oranges, pineapples, bananas, and red wine (yes a very very sad life, never mind hard to cook for!).
I tried to look online for someone else that has seen this reaction but have come up empty. It seems rice cereal is the least allergenic food out there and nobody reacts this way to it. One of my friends is a ped and she said she had never heard of a baby being allergic to rice cereal.
So what do you guys think? Do I try rice cereal again? Should i switch to oatmeal? When should I do it? I'm definitely waiting til the 6 month birthday at least. (he was 3 weeks early also so may even wait until 6mos3wks). We're both nervous we'll feed him and he'll stop breathing!
