If you have an allergic or intolerant child...

Twizzlers

Tue, Aug 11 2009, 11:41 am

do you make different suppers to accomodate? or do you just wipe that ingredient out of your house even though other children may be allowed to eat it?

here's my situation. my 16 month old is severely lactose intolerant. He cant eat any dairy. My 3 year old, on the other hand, loves dairy. So many times I make them separate suppers, but its getting tough, especially since they eat way earlier than I and dh, so sometimes I could make 3 suppers in one nite.

so far, I've been able to find some solutions, but I'm looking for more; macaroni and cheese - I pull out some plain macaroni for ds2 so they can both have. last nite I made french toast with rice dream instead of milk so they were both able to eat it.

also, I feel bad when ds1 is eating a yogurt (he really needs the calcium which is why I dont cut it out) and ds2 is looking on hungrily and whining for some.

what do you do???

rivkeah

Tue, Aug 11 2009, 11:46 am

Well as you say you try to make with and without dairy like macoronis. Well try making pizza without cheese that is not bad or even try toffuti cheese. There is also toffuti yogurts which aren't so bad. Well it is very hard, but he will just have to learn and get used to it like I did. And the younger you train them in the better off they are, and the more careful they can be.

Twizzlers

Tue, Aug 11 2009, 11:49 am

rivkeah wrote:

Well it is very hard, but he will just have to learn and get used to it like I did. And the younger you train them in the better off they are, and the more careful they can be.

I didnt really understand what you meant here, and this is really the heart of my question. is it too bad on the intolerant one that he has to have something different than everyone else? or too bad on the older one that he cant have something because not everyone can have it.

NotInNJMommy

Tue, Aug 11 2009, 11:49 am

I agree about learning "early on". My step brother was severely lactose intolerant when a toddler. Eventually he outgrew it, and even though he could digest things, he never acquired a taste for milk (cheese, yogurt, yes, but again, only bc it didn't make him sick when he got older).

He eats cereal with apple juice. (~30 years ago there wasn't a great availability of soy milk)

rivkeah

Tue, Aug 11 2009, 11:53 am

Well the younger one will have to suffer a little because he will have this where ever he goes eventually in school camp..... Especially, if he will not grow it out. Well just make sure not to give special treats for the older child rather just for him. Or if you give Dairy Ice cream or something buy him something special that he loves so he shouldn't feel so out of it.

Twizzlers

Tue, Aug 11 2009, 11:57 am

rivkeah wrote:

of course once he goes to school, he will have to understand that is different and cant have certain things (if he doesnt outgrow it, which I'm praying he will).

but my issue is right now. is it fair to say to a 16 month old "watch your brother eat, but no, you're not allowed to eat this?" he doesnt understand how bad it is for his health right now.

ra_mom

Tue, Aug 11 2009, 12:16 pm

Twizzlers wrote:

rivkeah wrote:

I know how you feel Twizzlers. Although dd is an only child so far, I really hate it when other parents who know our situation, give their children treats in front of dd, that she cannot have.
I feel it's important that everyone in the family should be able to eat supper equally. So it's important for me to make a dinner that we can all eat together.
I also feel that treats which one child cannot have, should not be in the house at all. It just isn't fair to wave treats that a child cannot have, in front of him.
But things like dairy foods for breakfast and lunch... although it's very hard on the child who cannot have it, it's also very important for the child who can have it, to get the proper dairy nutrients. This is the only part that I would say it's okay to say, "I'm sorry sweetie, but this food makes you a booboo.".
Again, the food should not be waved in the child's face. If possible, have the older child eat it privately. Explain to him about making his sibling feel jealous.
And always try to give the allergic child something that looks similar, if they are eating together. (ie. cheeseless pizza with sauce and cheese, a smoothie made with a milk alternative, etc.)

tovasmom

Tue, Aug 11 2009, 12:17 pm

My dd has celiac disease so she can't have wheat or gluten, which is pretty much a staple, so yes I cook for her separately and to the extent I can make similar things for her to eat. I will also try to pick gluten free things to cook to the extent possible to minimize both work for me and hard feelings for her. She ends up with more treats than the others, if anything, to compensate so the others might get resentful.

Annie

Tue, Aug 11 2009, 12:29 pm

My dairy allergic child was our first, so it was a little easier. I also waited a while before giving her little brothers dairy in case they were allergic too. They're not, B'H. DD was always given soy milk and soy cheese and soy yogurt, so if the others had yogurt, she got hers. I tried to buy simliar flavors. when I make mac n' cheese or lasagna, she gets some noodles. Now, it turns out that she's still allergic (she's 10 now), but she can have some cooked dairy without a hugely adverse reaction, and she's old enough to know what that reaction feels like. So, when we have pizza, I'll offer to take the cheese off, sometimes she'll say yes, and some times she'll say no. Until she was about 8, the cheese came off, period.

When we'd go for ice cream, either she'd get a soy version if they had it, or we'd get her a choc. covered banana or a cone with pareve whipped cream or something else. We figured it's something she's going to have to live with forever, so she might as well learn as a young child that she has different eating needs.

sunshine!

Tue, Aug 11 2009, 12:43 pm

My son is severely lactose intolerant as well, but we only found out about it when he was 3, so he was able to understand that the foods he wasn't allowed to have would give him pain if he ate it. Also, because his reactions were immediate, he electively chose not to eat the dairy. When I make dairy meals, I put some aside for him and keep it pareve. A favorite here is pizza, I just make his with sauce and veggies. Also, with the yogurt thing, he doesn't like soy yogurts, but he does like the soy puddings. So if my daughter has a yogurt, I allow him a pudding (I stick to vanilla so it won't look too enticing to the yogurt eater, as they are in clear plastic and chocolate LOOKS good, even though it might not taste so good).

pacifier

Tue, Aug 11 2009, 1:03 pm

B''H, you can use soy in almost everything. dd1 is allergic to dairy (getting better now b'h), and ds3 is allergic to soy....
Lesson: you cannot accommodate everyone all the time.
If anything, when a child has an allergy, they accept easier that they cannot have non kosher food, plus understand at a very young age the concepts of parve, dairy, meaty.

As for meals or treats, it is easy to cook without milk or cheese, then separate some parve food for the lactose intolerant child. The chocolate soy yoghourt has almost the same taste as regular chocolate dairy yoghourt, you can make pizza without cheese (tuna works great),and the only real issue is with ice cream and chocolate bars.

Marion

Tue, Aug 11 2009, 3:15 pm

DS#1 (and I) are severely peanut allergic. Interesting in a country where Bamba seems to be listed in the "rights of the child"! DS#2 is not allergic, but he doesn't get it. We do not allow nuts or peanuts in the house. (Nuts are often cross contaminated.) Yes, the daycare has been asked to ban Bamba (& peanut M&Ms) from birthday parties. No, I can't ban it from the park, which makes life a little harder. For daycare he had a bag of safe nosh in his cubby; I expect to continue that in gan next year as well. I also already told the daycare next year that I don't care if it's allowed in DS#2's classroom, but he is not allowed to have it...I will provide an alternative for him as well. I don't feel like I'm punishing my younger one, I feel like I'm protecting the two of us for whom it's a potentially life-threatening issue. The biggest thing DH did for me when he got married was give up peanut butter.

allgood

Tue, Aug 11 2009, 5:25 pm

First off, count your lucky stars that dairy is the only item your child is allergic to. That makes the list of things he's not allowed to eat, not that long. In regard to the yogurt I believe that fair isn't always equal. I think it's fair to allow one child to eat the yogurt and one not. I'm sure there are times that the other gets things the first one doesnt' Also your child is going to have to learn pretty quickly that there will be many times that he can't eat what he wants to.

As far as suppers go thankfully there are so many alternatives to cheese, and dairy- and we're not making it every day. I replace tofu and soy in all baked foods and I don't taste the difference. Anything with cheese my daughter doesn't eat.

bnm

Wed, Aug 12 2009, 3:01 am

I didn't really read the other posts thoroughly but I grew up with a few milk allergy siblings...

Lasagna-1 pan milchig, other pan parve
Parve baked ziti (now there is tofuti cheese)
tofutti cream cheese
parve cheese cake
parve cheese blintzes

yitzy's pancake batter comes in parve

cereal and milk (cow or soy)

there is a company that makes good soy yogurt not on Dairy Equipment, the healthfood stores on 13th avenue sell them (don't remember the name)

we never really had 2 complete different suppers but the few times the parve part of the supper got contaminated the allergy kids where able to pick takeout....

Mommy3.5

Wed, Aug 12 2009, 10:13 pm

We have over 15 allergens between two of my kids. Certain items are completely banned from the house as the allergies are too life threatening to play with.

I have trained my 3 year old to recognize sesame seeds, as he is deathly allergic too them. He will not touch something with a sesame seed on it. He has been taken to the hospital in hatzalah a few times and he knows what happens.

My older kids were taught to NEVER share food with the baby, because he is allergic to over 10 things.

I try to make only one supper a night, I use ingredients that are safe for everyone. On the rare occasion I make dairy, I make a parave alternative, that looks the same as the dairy one, so as not to upset the dairy allergic kids.