Milk-Free

My life, as far as food goes, has changed dramatically in the last several weeks. My 6 month-old has had a terrible rash on this face and body for months. Finally my doctor and my husband convinced me that I needed to change my diet to see if it's something he's allergic to in my milk.

I started by cutting out all the likely foods (wheat, soy, milk, peanuts, tree nuts, and eggs) leaving me almost no choices of food to eat. Somehow I survived a week of that and his rash went away! I then added back in wheat and milk, which brought back his rash. So I cut the milk again and after almost 2 weeks it went away. I have since added back eggs and soy with the rash staying at a minimum. Yay! I found out milk is most likely the only problem.

Now what? No milk. No ice cream! No cheese. No cottage cheese. No sour cream. No cream cheese. No butter. No margarine. No chocolate! No bread products made with milk. No anything else made with milk (which happens to be A LOT if you look at labels). No cooking with milk, butter, or margarine. To my dismay soy milk isn't that good and shortening in baking is a poor substitute.

My situation is temporary, although annoying. As soon as I wean my baby I'll no longer need to avoid these products, but is his? A lot of times kids grow out of milk allergies, but I really wonder if and how long that'll take. It's a whole different world trying to find something to cook and eat when you have to avoid so many common ingredients. There are substitutes out there for many of these products, but they are EXPENSIVE and so far I'm too cheap to try anything but the milk. Anyway, wish me luck, and especially my baby.

If you see a lot of milk-free recipes from me for awhile, you now know why.

Additional note (12/9/10): I have also discovered my son is allergic to tree nuts and peanuts.