Seeking Guidance for Son's Newly Diagnosed Food Sensitivities

My older son had a ton of food allergies, but cutting everything out of his diet seemed a little unrealistic. I took the holistic approach to reset his body to not be sensitive/allergic to everything. We use Dr. Kathy Perry at www.healthbyhandswellness.com in Arlington. She's a chiropractor/accupuncturist. She has a new laser treatment that can treat groups of allergies like all dairy products at one time. My oldest son couldn't eat hardly anything, now he has no food allergies. My youngest would break out into big hives if he went anywhere near orange juice and that was gone with one treatment. I was allergic to milk/lactose for 35 years until I had the dairy treatment. We've been allergy free for 5 years now. I tried accupuncturist that use NAET, but the treatments only lasted one year and then all our allergies came back. It was extremely expensive for something that didn't last. Some of the food sensitivities can be reversed and some can't. Everyone is different. Growing up with tons of allergies myself, I was very adamant that my kids not be held hostage to being sick all the time. Dr. Perry's methods will seem a little wacky, but they worked for us. Good luck with whatever route you choose.

My son is allergic to Dairy, Soy, Wheat, Eggs, Peanuts, Tree Nuts, Sesame Seeds, Corn. I have the same problem as you. I use coconut milk when I cook him certain things. Tapioca is also a good alternative to wheat. Mostly I stick to fruits, veges, rice, meats, fish, coconut, oats etc.
For snack foods I recommend http://www.allergygrocer.com/
I take my son to a pediatric allergist at UTSW and he recommended this site. My friends who have allergy babies also buy from this site after I recommended it. We all absolutely love it.
For Christmas I bought him Organic Peppermint Candy Canes, Enjoy Life Foods Soy Free Chocolate Chips, and a lot more stuff from allergy grocer.
It is so easy, as you can read the labels and filter out the allergy ingredients on their site and choose what is best for your kids. And they deliver it home in about 3 days. And the food tastes really good. Try it and you will love it....

I am so sorry that your son was diagnosed with this. I remember feeling overwhelmed when my daughter was diagnosed with 1 food allergy. I can only imagine your angst at facing numerous allergies!

Here are my ideas... It's late so sorry if long and I ramble:

My first suggestion is to buy a bread machine, one that can make bread as well as jam, pizza/pasta dough, cookie dough, cake, etc. You're going to have to homecook most items since soy is inso much pre-made food. You'll need tools/appliances to help you do it quickly. I bought the Zojirushi brand bread machine from Amazon.

I also use a popsicle maker (bought from Williams-Sonoma). It was a little pricy, but since one of your children can't have real ice-cream and the other can't have soy ice cream, fancy homemade popsicles that freeze in 9 minutes might be a solution for you.

You should start googling recipes that use flour from potato, barley, oat and rice. You can make bread and pasta with barley, oat and potato flour, so you can make him sandwiches and noodles (most store bought bread/pasta has soy). You might need to experiment with recipes that call for wheat and substitute with other flour types.

My daughter has a milk allergy like your other son, however she can eat goat diary. I mention goat dairy for 2 reasons: 1.) many recipes require a fat ingredient in order for the recipe to work correctly. A lot of processed food is replacing dairy fat with soy (soy is cheaper than dairy). However, since your son is allergic to soy, that will wipe out a majority of commercial pre-made food that use vegetable and saffola oil. I am assuming you will homecook with goat butter, olive oil or canola oil instead? 2.). Since you don't want to prepare multiple items to appease each son's diet, if your son that is allergic to cows milk dairy can eat goat dairy then you should be able to cook with goat milk/butter/yogurt for everyone-?

Like bread needs milk and butter in the ingredients in order for the crust to be squishy; French bread isnt made with milk/butter, but the crust isnt squishy (although commercial french bread seems to be made with soy lechin; homemade doesnt have soy). If both your sons can tolerate goat milk & goat butter, then you won't have to have one loaf of bread for one and another for the other.

For on-the-go commercial snacks, here are a few ideas:
Apple sauce
Dole fruit cups
Rice cakes
Rice crackers & rice cookies (check out the Asian food section in your grocery store)
Fruit leather
Freeze-dried peas, strawberries & bananas (my daughter loves these! Made by Just Tomatoes. Check out www.justtomatoes.com)
Almond butter & jam for PB&J sandwich.

Your son with multiple allergies can have cows milk dairy, right? So at least he can have yogurt, string cheese, cottage cheese, etc.

My son also has mulitple food allergies, so I know how frustrating it can be. I write a food blog with a dietitian. All of the recipes, product reviews and tips are free of the 8 top allergens, gluten-free and vegan. Although some recipes use corn and/or flaxseed, most should be good for your family. Our website is www.welcomingkitchen.com. Good luck!

Try banana Laurabars if he can tolerate almonds. Costco has some packages of dehydrated fruit that my three year old loves. Costco also has pouches of squeezable applesauce that are fun for kids to eat. Also you can try cooking with organic grassfed ghee. Check online but I think the part of the dairy that would cause your child to react has been taken out and it can handle being used at very high temperatures. There are gluten free pretzels at Central Market that are very good. I'm not sure of the ingredient list so you'd have to check that for other offending ingredients.

I saw a book called, Feeding Isaiah, that a mother wrote when her son was diagnosed with multiple food allergies. You might want to see if you can find it. It looked really good. Unfortunately, when I saw it at Costco, my daughter wasn't yet diagnosed. As soon as we knew we had to eliminate wheat and gluten, the book was gone. I need to find it also. But, I think she covers way more than just the allergies we are dealing with. I know she at least covers dairy in it as well, but I think it was quite a bit more than that, too. Blessings to you as you work to get your sweet son well.

I use either Steve Homoky or Cheannie Marquis at ACM Health Solutions in Plano for the AAT treatments. I had been lactose intolerant for 14 years, and while I still occasionally react to cheese, it's usually a sign that my stress levels are too high. My kids have been through these treatments, too, and it's been remarkable for them to have stayed unaffected by their former allergens for over 7 years now. I'm not sure why the other poster had such poor luck with her NAET treatments. That's sad, because we have had great success with ours. Good luck! Their number is ###-###-#### and they are at Coit & Spring Creek.

We do allergy clearing in my clinic using AACT. Call us ###-###-####.
Dagnanchiropractic.com
J.

My family and I have been taking a great supplement since March that has helped us with many health issues, one of which is lactose intolerance. I have spoken to some moms whose kids have similar food sensitivities that you mentioned, and the supplement has helped them. Let me know if you'd like more info... God bless you and your family! I know this is a tough challenge!

Ask for a referral to a dietician. They are your best resource.

Don't forget that products for the hair, skin and body can contain these things too. Arbonne DOES NOT use animal products or dairy or nut oils in the ABC baby products or in our Childrens Vitamins that come in a powder form that you can mix with juice or water and you can even freeze them into a popsickle and a long list of other ingredients that are not good for us. If you would like more information I have sent you a private message with my web site and my email address.
Kay

Here's an article I saw yesterday in the Wall Street Journal about new guidelines for diagnosing kids with food allergies. Lots of kids are being diagnosed with multiple food allergies based on blood tests when in practice many of the foods don't affect the kids. So you may want to be check on the accuracy of the tests before launching into such a big diet change.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870415630457...

My son has multiple food allergies (diary, egg, wheat, barley, oat, rye, beef, lamb, chicken, onion, garlic, grape, cherry, corn), a condition called Eosinophilic Esophagitis, and food aversion. So...he can (and will) eat six foods (turkey, pork, potato, apple, blueberry, and rice). All that said, I feel your pain. My first recommendation is to have your allergist confirm the IgE blood test results with prick or patch testing. Were the blood tests done with LabCorp or Quest? Quest Labs does a more reliable LabCorp test. Quest does ImmunCap testing. LabCorp does RAST testing.