B.A.B.E. Week 6: Milk protein issues...but we are on our way home!

Because we live in the Bahamas, we came to the U.S. to have Elle.  One of the reasons that we chose Nashville (out of all the amazing places for medical care and living in the U.S.) was because my sister, Catherine, who is an incredible mother of four lives there.   Catherine has hosted me/us for the past three plus months and we are incredibly grateful.  And while we rented our own space for part of the time that we were in Nashville, it was so comforting to always have a home-base with Catherine's family.   

We spent our last four nights at our "home-base".   This turned out to be incredibly good for me because on the first of those four nights, Friday night, Wilson had not yet arrived and I was exhausted and nauseas.  Friday was frankly a terrible day and by the time I arrived at my sister's, I was spent.  Catherine took Elle in her arms and comforted and took care of her while I fell into a deep sleep.   After Elle fell into a deep sleep at about 12:30 am, Catherine tip-toed into my room to get Elle's bed.  Catherine had planned to sleep on the floor next to Elle and take care of her through the night so I could rest.  I awoke to Catherine's stealthy moves and felt much much better.   So I took Elle back into my room for the night.  That night, Elle ended up sleeping until 4:50 am!  Because Elle has had great weight gain, in this instance, I was happy to give her digestive system a break and my overall system one as well.  I owe Catherine in so many ways.

Catherine's youngest daughter holding Elle

Friday had been particularly hard for various reasons but first and foremost was because Elle had a terrible Thursday night.   She threw up a massive amount around 7:30 pm and then felt ill the rest of the night.   I called Catherine's husband, a pediatric pulmnologist, and he advised me to give her frequent sips of breast milk and see if she could tolerate it.   If not, then pedialyte.   She didn't have a fever so we decided to wait until the morning to call the pediatrician.   She did drink a little throughout the night but didn't have a wet diaper from 12:30 am to 8:30 am  -- very unusual for her.  When we did see the pediatrician on Friday morning, he said that 3 wet diapers in 24 hours is the magic number -- less than that and the baby is dehydrated.   Luckily, even though Elle's wet diaper output was much less than normal -- it was certainly more than 3 in 24 hours.

Seeing Elle sick was so much worse than my mastitis – I felt scared and powerless.  After some tests and diagnostics the pediatrician stated that he was reasonably confident that Elle has a dairy protein sensitivity.  Thus, she is sensitive to dairy products that I had been eating - and I have been eating my fair share of those since giving birth with cheese, milk, ice cream, and yogurt comprising significant components of my diet.  Sadly, these foods unknowingly aggravated her little system so much that she had blood in stool and the thrown up.  This milk sensitivity might have also been combined with a 24 hour stomach bug that went through all of our family.  But if it was, I am glad that we all got the stomach bug because then Elle’s milk sensitivity was diagnosed.

I think that some milk sensitivities may go undiagnosed in babies because as I wrote about in my last blog – fussiness in babies can be normal.   Also in our case, I didn’t think anything was wrong until Elle threw up.   She is generally pretty happy and I couldn’t actually see the blood in Elle’s stool – the doctor had to test it for blood.   That said, there were things that could have clued me in – the screams of pain in the middle of sleeping, the stringiness/mucousy-ness of her stool, her disposition to sometimes wheeze after a feeding, and a family history of milk-sensitivity.  Wilson is sensitive to milk products and other members of his family have the same sensitivity as well.

Elle still isn’t 100% because it takes about 5-7 days for all milk products to clear from my system but she is getting better.  That said, it is hard not to worry over the outbreaks of baby acne or how she now wants to suck on her pacifier most of the day.  I am not sure if the dependence on the pacifier is because she is still in pain or if she just really enjoys the sucking motion.   We try not to completely depend on the pacifier.  Like the internet “experts” say, we try other methods to comfort her first – rocking, fans, going outside etc.  But most things don’t work and she ends up becoming VERY frustrated.  I guess it is a “habit” that we will watch and see how she fares – especially after the milk proteins clear from my system and we finally reach home.

Home!  I am typing this blog post from the airport as we wait for our flight home.   Wow, it will be so nice to do mundane things from home -- in our own ecosystem.  I am looking forward to tummy and bath times that have a rhythm and to creating general patterns/routines in our collective life.    And of course, since we live in the Bahamas, I am looking forward to walking on the beach wearing baby Elle (in the morning or evening).  We’ll see if I can get out there when the day is cool enough but at least it is a nice concept for now.