New with question about allergies

Hi - I'm new to this board. I'm a SAHM with 2 little girls, one is 21
months and one is 7 weeks. My question is about my toddler. The air
quality has been really bad here lately and for awhile now, I've been
noticing how she rubs her eyes alot. Yesterday she started complaining
about it, saying "eyes, eyes" and then again today she's complaining
about it. I called her doctor's office and talked to the nurse who
said to try Benadryl, which I did just today, so we'll see how it goes
with that.

Has anyone experienced allergies like this with their toddler? She
doesn't have any other noticable symptoms that I can tell. I can't
imagine what else it could be other than allergies. She doesn't have
anything in her eyes, and allergies run in my family on both sides. I
have seasonal allergies and am allergic to soap, fragrance, eye
makeup, all sorts of things. My DH has eczema really bad on his hands
and arms, and my 7 week old is lactose intolerant, so this type of
thing is not foreign to our family, to say the least.

Does this sound like allergies to anyone? Or is there something else
that anyone can think of? I wear glasses, but my prescription is very
very light and my husband has perfect vision, as does most of his
family. I just want to help my poor little girl!

Thanks!

Beth
SAHM to Angelina (8/4/02) and Isabella (3/7/04)

Hi -

Your toddler may well have seasonal allergies. See if the benadryl
helps. If it does, talk to your ped. about trying out claritin (or one
of its less expensive generics) or zyrtec (available by prescription).
You might also enquire about eye drops (for symptomatic relief),
although it can be quite hard to get the drops where they work on a
non-cooperative toddler.

Your 7-week old, by the way, is almost certainly NOT lactose
intolerant. It's vanishingly rare for lactose intolerance to occur in
the first year of life. It is, however, very common for infants to have
an intolerance to, or even allergy to, cow's milk PROTEIN. In either
event, breastfeeding is the best nutrition, and soy formula is the next
best choice.

A final thing you might try is to look at the book "Is This Your Child?"
by Dr. Doris Rapp. It's probably at your local library, and is an easy,
informative read. It has to do with allergies (various types) in
infants and children.

Good luck!
--Beth Kevles

http://web.mit.edu/kevles/www/nomilk.html -- a page for the milk-allergic
Disclaimer: Nothing in this message should be construed as medical
advice. Please consult with your own medical practicioner.

NOTE: No email is read at my MIT address. Use the AOL one if you would
like me to reply.

Some pollen is so large that it is irritating to the eyes even if you're not
allergic to it. Pine pollen, in particular, is very large and depending on
where you are and the prevalence of pine trees, that could be the problem.

Leigh



"Beth Kevles" wrote in message
...

Hi -

Your toddler may well have seasonal allergies. See if the benadryl
helps. If it does, talk to your ped. about trying out claritin (or one
of its less expensive generics) or zyrtec (available by prescription).
You might also enquire about eye drops (for symptomatic relief),
although it can be quite hard to get the drops where they work on a
non-cooperative toddler.

Your 7-week old, by the way, is almost certainly NOT lactose
intolerant. It's vanishingly rare for lactose intolerance to occur in
the first year of life. It is, however, very common for infants to have
an intolerance to, or even allergy to, cow's milk PROTEIN. In either
event, breastfeeding is the best nutrition, and soy formula is the next
best choice.

A final thing you might try is to look at the book "Is This Your Child?"
by Dr. Doris Rapp. It's probably at your local library, and is an easy,
informative read. It has to do with allergies (various types) in
infants and children.

Good luck!
--Beth Kevles

http://web.mit.edu/kevles/www/nomilk.html -- a page for the
milk-allergic
Disclaimer: Nothing in this message should be construed as medical
advice. Please consult with your own medical practicioner.

NOTE: No email is read at my MIT address. Use the AOL one if you would
like me to reply.

In ,
bshadder wrote:

*Has anyone experienced allergies like this with their toddler? She
*doesn't have any other noticable symptoms that I can tell. I can't

My 3.5 year old has terrible allergies. In fact, his
allergist/pulmonologist has gone so far as to tell me when we first saw
him when my son was 3 years old that "kids this young don't have seasonal
allergies" (he said this prior to the skin testing which proved my son has
allergies) and then "gosh, I've never seen allergies this bad in a kid
this young and so early in the season!" (he said this just about two weeks
ago about my son who was already taking the max dose of zyrtec and
intranasal steroids and still suffering ). And this allergist is well
respected in his field and very very experienced!

*Does this sound like allergies to anyone? Or is there something else

It certainly could be, although it is early for her to have them. The
first year my son displayed allergy symptoms was the summer before he
turned two years old, and his initial symptoms were simply increasing
crabbiness and clinginess, progressing to undereye circles, red itchy oozy
eyes, sneezing, difficulty breathing, and ultimately sinus infections and
pneumonia! But at first it was just the crabby/clinginess and it was hard
to figure out what was going on.

--
hillary israeli vmd http://www.hillary.net
"uber vaccae in quattuor partes divisum est."
not-so-newly minted veterinarian-at-large

Thanks for the book title - I'll definitely check it out. I think our
family is one big allergen!

I checked out your milk-allergic page - interesting and very
informative. I am not positive about the lactose intolerance in our 7
week old medically speaking, but in my experience, cutting out the
lactose has made a huge difference for her. I am not able to
breastfeed, so we had her on regular milk-based formula. She
exhibited classic lactose intolerance symptoms - excessive gas, red
ring-rash around her diaper area, excessive spitting up (and our first
was a spitter-upper - this was different), gut-wrenching stomach aches
where she'd arch her back in pain, wouldn't sleep at night and would
just whimper all night long, and she hadn't gained back her birth
weight by her 2 week check-up. So we switched her to soy. Her diaper
rash disappeared within one day. She started gaining weight like a
champ. But she was so gassy she couldn't sleep at night and would
again whimper all night long.

We took her to the doctor. She was diagnosed with reflux and given a
prescription for Zantac. I have read that Zantac can cause insomnia
and irritability in infants and I didn't want to go that route because
I wasn't 100% convinced she needed to be medicated. The doctor said
to go ahead and experiment with different formulas - so we tried Good
Start. Bad move - within minutes of it hitting her stomach she was
projectile vomitting. So then we tried Enfamil LactoFree. It's like
we have a new baby. She can sleep at night without whimpering, no
stomach aches, no excessive gas, great weight gain, much less spitting
up, but the thing I really noticed was her demeanor - she had a happy
look on her face that had never been there before. She looked
pleasant and before she always looked like she was in pain, even on
the soy formula.

So that's why we think lactose intolerance. Since we've had her on
the lactose free, all of her reflux symptoms have totally disappeared.
I'm so glad we didn't go the Zantac route. My mom is lactose
intolerant, and so is one of my uncles, and my sister is completely
dairy intolerant - both lactose and milk proteins. So I don't know if
our baby is actually lactose intolerant in the medical sense, but in
the practical sense, she sure is doing better on the lactose free
formula.

Thanks for the info - I appreciate it.

Beth
SAHM to Angelina (8/4/02) and Isabella (3/7/04)



(Beth Kevles) wrote in message ...
Hi -

Your toddler may well have seasonal allergies. See if the benadryl
helps. If it does, talk to your ped. about trying out claritin (or one
of its less expensive generics) or zyrtec (available by prescription).
You might also enquire about eye drops (for symptomatic relief),
although it can be quite hard to get the drops where they work on a
non-cooperative toddler.

Your 7-week old, by the way, is almost certainly NOT lactose
intolerant. It's vanishingly rare for lactose intolerance to occur in
the first year of life. It is, however, very common for infants to have
an intolerance to, or even allergy to, cow's milk PROTEIN. In either
event, breastfeeding is the best nutrition, and soy formula is the next
best choice.

A final thing you might try is to look at the book "Is This Your Child?"
by Dr. Doris Rapp. It's probably at your local library, and is an easy,
informative read. It has to do with allergies (various types) in
infants and children.

Good luck!
--Beth Kevles

http://web.mit.edu/kevles/www/nomilk.html -- a page for the milk-allergic
Disclaimer: Nothing in this message should be construed as medical
advice. Please consult with your own medical practicioner.

NOTE: No email is read at my MIT address. Use the AOL one if you would
like me to reply.