I remember only too well how overwhelming it felt when I was faced with the prospect of cutting dairy from my diet. How incredibly scary it was seeing my son covered in hives after having his first direct reaction. The enormous weight of the extra responsibility I suddenly had on my shoulders now I needed to keep him safe from something we ordinarily encountered multiple times every day. Baby groups, cafes, friend’s houses, the park – all places that were now suddenly danger zones instead of somewhere to relax. My whole world changed that day and I felt confused, overwhelmed, anxious and very very alone.
We’ve come a long way since that time nearly 5 years ago, and I have made it my mission to help support other parents who are walking those same steps. I have created space for mothers who choose the same path I did to find advice, support, and perhaps most importantly to know they are not alone. I have created CMPA resources detailing everything I have learnt during this journey, mostly from reading by phone light at 2 am on nights when the baby just wouldn’t sleep. Sharing tips and ideas that have come about from my learned experience, or from other mothers who held me up on the harder days. I aim to make this information as easily accessible as possible, so that parents can find the answers to their questions with relative ease, but I know that sometimes it all feels like too much to take in. So this post is designed to hold your hand through those first bits, and walk you through some of the most informative or important posts I’ve written, as a crash course in breastfeeding with CMPA. Hopefully it’s helpful, and with any luck after reading through these everything you will feel just a tiny bit more at ease.
- If you suspect your baby is suffering from an allergy to cows milk and you are breastfeeding, head over to my Facebook support group right away.
- The first thing you really need to do is confirm whether or not you’re dealing with CMPA (Cows Milk Protein Allergy). This post walks you through doing that.
- As you start out on your initial period of being dairy free, you’ll feel like you can’t eat anything. Check out my dairy and soya free treat list to discover cake and chocolate that you can actually eat!
- You’ve got questions I know. What is non IgE? What about products that say ‘may contain milk’? Check out my CMPA FAQ pages to get the answers you need.
- It can feel really tough, especially in the beginning. Here’s 1o things that don’t suck about going dairy free.
- Eating out can feel like a challenge, but here’s a vlog with some tips for eating out with food allergies.
- You may start to wonder whether you/your baby are getting all the right vitamins, or you may be staring at all the alternative milks wondering which one would be best. Here’s some advice on vitamins and a comparison chart for dairy free milks.
- You’ll probably start finding that you get unsolicited advice from just about everyone, and they often mean well but seem misinformed. This post tackles some common myths than go along with breastfeeding with CMPA.
- Eventually you’ll lose a bit of patience for some of these comments and might need a giggle, so here’s my viral video on things that allergy parents are sick of hearing.
- It can all feel really overwhelming and isolating, and feeling helpless while your little one is still feeling poorly is really normal too. Here’s 5 practical tips to help while you’re breastfeeding with CMPA.
- You may begin to feel like being dairy free isn’t helping, or there’s something else upsetting your baby. This post explains what to do when being dairy free hasn’t helped.
- You may need to start keeping a food diary to help look for patterns.
- If you accidentally slip up and consume dairy, don’t panic. Here’s what to do after a slip up.
- If you’re feeling alone in all of this, and fed up with searching for danger while everyone else gets to relax and have fun then my open letter to the other mothers might be worth a read.
- Need a little inspiration for some treats? All of my dairy free recipes are simple, and easy to do while holding a baby or baking with a toddler.
- Something like travelling abroad can feel almost impossible, but here are some tips on coping with food allergies on holiday.
- As your baby gets older you might start to think about if you want to carry on feeding or not. If you’re thinking about moving on from breastfeeding then this post will help.
- Eventually (once your baby is around 12 months old, has been reaction free for 6 months and is confirmed non IgE CMPA) you might find yourself thinking about the milk ladder. Here’s my comprehensive guide to the milk ladder and CMPA.
- If your child is IgE CMPA then you may find yourself preparing for a milk challenge in hospital. Here’s some of my thoughts and feelings when we attempted this for the first time.