Huge improvement in oats allergy!!

1 and a half weeks ago my little climber got into the pantry, climbed up a few shelves and found a box of muesli bars. I was busy hanging up washing outside and had no idea what she was up to. When i found her she had bitten through the wrapping and eaten about 1/4 of the muesli bar. I was in sudden freak out mode. There were sooo many bad foods in that bar! Oats, rice, sultanas, apple, sunflower oil and the list goes on. Amazingly though apart from a few foul poos the next day there was no reaction. I was in shock and so confused. How could she react to such a teeny tiny amount of pumpkin just days before and then eat a few mouthfuls of her worst known foods without a single problem?? FPIES is so weird!! 

The next day i decided to be brave and fed her a little bit more of the muesli bar. I just wanted to know if it was just a fluke that there was no real reaction or if she had actually started to outgrow some of her allergies. There was still no problems apart from one mucous filled poo. Excitement started to kick in. Could this be it?? Could her body be starting to tolerate foods that previously she reacted to severely? I decided then it was time to do an oat trial. 

It's been 9 days of her having small amounts of porridge for breakfast. Things since starting have been very confusing. We have had good days and bad days, normal poo and disgusting poo, tantrums, sensory issues and some reflux. It hasn't been overly bad but even staying on 2 teaspoons hasn't improved anything. I was going to stick to it but this Mumma needs sleep. Night times (especially the last 3) have been terrible. I'm tired and over it. 

It is absolutely awesome that she has tolerated oats so well compared to what used to happen when she was a baby. But i don't think there is any point pushing it right now. I'll wait another 6 months and then give it another try. 

For the next three weeks we are having another break from trials as Reuben is away and i don't feel like dealing with any reactions on my own. I'll keep you posted on what we try next. 

Pumpkin = FAIL

I usually don't start trials at dinner time but sometimes i have this feeling Iyla will be fine with the food and then just give her some. Well last night was one of those nights where it was my own fault i was up all night with a screaming child. After her usual dinner i went to give her half a teaspoon of the pumpkin soup i made. She HATED it and spat what i thought was all of it out. I then gave her some cheese and she dropped it into a drop of the pumpkin soup that was on her highchair. Well as i'm sure you guessed she down right refused to eat that cheese even after i wiped the soup off. This is extremely out of character for Iyla. She likes most foods and you would think that pumpkin soup being so sweet would be a huge hit. And to give up her cheese like that! Anyone who knows Iyla well enough will know how obsessed she is with her cheese!

She must have ingested the tiniest bit of pumpkin and we had a pretty horrible night. There was no vomiting but lots of obvious tummy pain and reflux. Usually i would push on for another day and see if things got worse but because she isn't going to eat it anyway there is no point. We'll just add it to the bad foods list and stay away from it for now.

Ready to start foods again...

Over the past 5 weeks we haven't done any food trails as we all just wanted a break and to be able to enjoy Christmas and the start to a new year.

But it's about that time again that we start a new food. It's going to be pumpkin so we will see how that goes. Right now i have some pumpkin soup cooking on the stove with butternut pumpkin, onion, potato, carrot and homemade chicken stock. It should taste good! Hopefully Iyla thinks so too and isn't too upset that she can only have one spoon of it at the start. I'm not sure yet it i'm going to start tonight or wait till after the weekend. I can't decide what is better, having Reuben home to help me deal with it if she does have a reaction or waiting until during the week so that we can enjoy our weekend together. Hoping we get another pass anyway! Having no reaction would be awesome!!

I'm not sure if i mentioned earlier but before our break Iyla added beef to her diet. This has been really handy!

I hope this year is a fantastic year for all of you! 

Update

I'm sorry it's been such a long time since i'm updated this blog. I just keep forgetting! Things have been going great for Iyla food wise lately. On top of her recent dairy and chicken passes she has also added egg and carrot to her diet!! So exciting! It is great to see her diet expanding so much and with such awesome foods! Because of this I was starting to think that maybe she had outgrown all her allergies...that was wishful thinking!! Last Friday i gave her a small piece of apple. It wasn't such a good idea! The next day on top of being miserable from that reaction she drank some water out of a bucket that had fish in it while on a fishing trip. There was quite a few big vomits and screaming and lots of disgusting poo the next day. Then on top of that she caught a horrible flu with high fevers. It's been a long week!!

I'm looking forward to her getting better and then starting some new foods. I have no idea what to try yet but probably another vegetable.

No more neocate!

I had a phone appointment with Iyla's dietician yesterday and because Iyla can now have dairy she is allowed to start drinking cows milk instead of her neocate formula. I was a little worried that the food she can eat wont give enough nutrients without it. But she is barely drinking her formula now anyway so we are hoping she'll drink more cows milk and that she we can add foods to her diet quicker now that it seems she is tolerating things better then what she used to. 

We also have an appointment at PMH on the 27th for a check up and probably skin prick testing just to rule out any other possible allergies. 

We were supposed to start a chicken trial yesterday but the poor little miss is sick with high fevers and was vomiting last night. Hopefully this doesn't mess up her gut and cause things to go backward again.

DAIRY is SAFE!!!! Woohoo!!

There is huge excitement in this house at the moment! Iyla is no longer allergic to dairy!!! A few months back I decided I wanted to give NAET treatment a go again. I know how to do it myself so I held a bottle of milk against Iyla and did the weird massage that somehow tells the brain that the food isn’t bad. 24 hours later we muscle tested milk and it was still bad so I did the massage again. I had to do this for 3 days and then finally the test was good. Since that time Iyla has had so many reactions to other things that we haven’t had a chance to really trial dairy. But I was giving her small bites of yogurt every now and again without that causing any issues. This week she has finally been doing really well reaction wise so I have increased her dairy amount. She has been having a few spoons of yogurt daily and I’ve made her pancakes with half milk half water instead of her formula. There have been no problems at all!! I’m so excited! Dairy is HUGE!!! And now that NAET has worked for one food I’ll definitely be trying it with others in the future.

So confused, frustrated, tired and sick of FPIES!!

We have no idea what is going on with Iyla at the moment. She just isn't getting better...well we might have a good day or two here or there...but mostly she is miserable, sleeping crap, eating very little, pooing out copious amounts of mucous, then pooing out hard pebbles and randomly vomiting. Every time we start to get excited that she is getting better things go down hill again and i'm ready to scream to the world that i HATE FPIES!!! 

I'm sure everyone that see us thinks things must be going well because every time we drop Connor off at school or pick him up she is full of smiles and cute hellos for anyone walking past. I'm thankful for the fact that after the screaming in the car the whole way to school i get a few minutes of peace (until we are back in the car or home again) but i feel like she is making me look like i'm making this whole thing up. Trust me, i wish i was! I would stop 'making it up' in a heartbeat so that we could have our happy little girl back. 

We are thinking that her reaction to the soy in the homebrand wheat biscuits has messed up her gut and that it might take awhile for things to go fully back to normal. We are also wondering if it will be worth it to put her on complete gut rest for a week. That means no solid food and only formula. I'll talk to her dietician about it first and see what she thinks. Iyla will hate it and i know it will rough on us too as getting her to drink her bottles lately is a huge battle. But something needs to change before we all go completely insane.