Currently, I have a 9 month old baby girl who has a dairy allergy; Thankfully we discovered it early and were able to fix it but I wanted to share my experience with other moms!
What is a dairy allergy:
When I tell people that my daughter has a dairy allergy, their immediate reaction is to call it "lactose intolerant" - this was my instinct too. However, after doing more research, I realized a dairy allergy and lactose intolerance are actually two different things. Let's first break down two things: the difference between dairy and lactose as well as allergy and intolerance
Dairy: allergic to the protein in dairy
Lactose: intolerant to the sugar (lactose) in dairy
Intolerance: the body has a chemical reaction to eating a particular food or drink.
Allergy: the immune system reacts to a food, which is usually harmless.
How I knew she had a Dairy Allergy:
In the beginning, my daughter would cry for HOURS. during the day. during the evening, during the entire night. She would even wake up in the middle of the night and cry for two hours straight not being able to console her. When I went to the doctor, they just diagnosed it as "colic" but I knew something was wrong. Since I was breastfeeding, I decided to do one day of just formula to troubleshoot and see if it was something in my milk. Later that day she broke out in a head-to-toe rash and was so upset. I looked at the ingredients of the formula and the very first ingredient was "dairy". Typically when my daughter gets my milk there are only small traces of dairy (depending on what I eat), but this day she had straight dairy ALL day long and she was miserable.
How we fixed it:
After that day I cut out dairy from my diet, and within a week she was the happiest baby ever. Therefore, we knew it was due to the dairy. However, at around 5 months I was wanting to switch to formula, but didn't know which one to choose.
The best formula for dairy allergy:
There are a few different things that you need to consider when picking a formula for a dairy allergy. First and foremost, you need to make sure that the ingredients say "Hydrolyzed milk protein". This means that the dairy protein is already broken down before it is put into the formula, causing it to be easily digestible for a child with a dairy allergy. Additionally, if your child has a dairy allergy and not a lactose intolerance, it is best to find a formula that uses lactose as the sugar as opposed to other sugars. This is because lactose is the sugar that is naturally in milk, causing the formula to better replicate mom's milk when breastfeeding. Therefore, after tons of research, we found HIPP HA formula, which is actually a German brand but it has English translations.
Link to the formula: https://organicsbestshop.com/products/hipp-combiotic-ha-1
If you have any additional questions, don't hesitate to reach out to me (Samantha Carney) in the WhatsApp Fair Lawn Moms chat, and I'd be happy to chat more about my experience.
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