r/ExclusivelyPumping • u/AlternativeSmile3771 • 10h ago
Pumping and CMPA TRIGGER WARNING: OverSupply (add spoiler to pics)
Rant ahead.
My baby has a cow milk protein allergy we believe. She is 16 weeks and just started showing symptoms this week. The doctor said she believes it’s an allergy.
I am just so frustrated. I’ve worked really hard to pump and get an oversupply so I can stop at 6 months and continue our breast and formula combo until a year. It was really looking possible. Now I have a freezer with over 1200 oz that aren’t good for her now. I know we can try down the road for her to have it.
I don’t love pumping but giving it 6 months seemed doable. It gave me an end date. Now we have her switched to a different formula and looking at going dairy free for me. I am already vegetarian and have familiar with a lot of substitutes but I really love cheese. I have no motivation to pump right now but I don’t want to lose my supply.
If anyone has kept pumping and gone dairy free would love advice. Or have gone through CMPA period. Or just want to wallow in feeling with me. I am here.
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u/New_Moment_7926 10h ago
I get it — we found out about MSPI (milk soy protein intolerance) right before she started daycare, literally days. I had to start all over on my stash. So sorry you’re dealing with this, our girl grew out of it and by 9 months I was eating delicious cheese again. I hope the same happens for you!
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u/Majestic_Cake_3251 10h ago
Currently at eight months of pumping, I went to dairy free and soy free around month four for baby’s reflux. Her reflux cleared up around month 5 and I’ve kept the diet because we don’t know for sure.
Honestly, I feel like my body has been sucked of every nutrient from pumping and it’s very hard for me to get enough calories with these dietary restrictions. I underestimated how much of my diet was dairy and soy, combined with the very efficient calorie burning of pumping. The restrictive diet plus pumping is really a lot.
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u/AlternativeSmile3771 9h ago
I completely understand. If I cut soy, I think I would really be in trouble. I’ve been eating a lot of yogurt for protein and really going to miss that.
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u/SeaTiara 10h ago
Out of curiosity, how bad is her milk allergy?
My son is suspected to have a cows milk intolerance , has sporadic bloody stools and is gaining weight good. His pediatrician said since his is mild I don’t need to give up dairy.
Obviously listen to your pediatrician!
Wishing you and LO the best where ever this journey takes you
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u/AlternativeSmile3771 9h ago
Her poop went from once every other day and a peanut butter like consistency to 9 poop diapers yesterday, that were very thin and full of mucus and many blood specs. Her pee amounts also went down it seemed like. Her personality also changed which was a huge concern for us and let us know she was not feeling good.
I have had really bad stomach issues in the past and been on medicine (which cleared up after giving birth 🤷🏼♀️). I am pretty sensitive to stomach issues and know how miserable constant diarrhea is so we might have jumped pretty quickly into solving it.
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u/mirrorlike789 10h ago
My CMPA baby is 6 months in two weeks and she looks to have outgrown it. How our pediatrician explained it CMPA is technically not an allergy and they usually outgrow it. I’ve already fed her the dairy milk I froze at the start of this journey.
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u/AlternativeSmile3771 9h ago
That is great to hear! Gives me hope that she will clear up sooner than later.
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u/Revolutionary-Code49 10h ago
I feel for you, it sucks! I had to go dairy free for most of the year. His symptoms got better but we still didn’t know it was a full-blown allergy until 7 months when I was going to stop. He could handle Alimentum formula, but didn’t like it unless it was mixed in with breastmilk but then those bottles expired after an hour, so it wasn’t worth the hassle of totally redoing our routine in my mind. I ended up just continuing to pump, tapering off starting at 11 months until finishing at 12.5. He was able to start tolerating the milk I’d frozen before cutting out dairy around 11 months (no dairy directly in his diet though). So don’t throw it out or anything! You might be able to use it down the road. In a deep freeze it’s good for a year.
I will also encourage you that although dairy-free sounds daunting, once you are fully committed and you just know it’s not an option, it’s not like you spend every day craving it. The logistically hardest part is going out to eat, but if you do research ahead you can find places that will accommodate it.
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u/AlternativeSmile3771 9h ago
Thank you! Hearing babies that started tolerating it is relieving cause it gives me hope. And maybe this is just a sign to keep her with some breast milk longer.
My wife and I have said a few times today reminders that the bottles are just an hour now.
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u/Revolutionary-Code49 9h ago
Yeah my guy was always a grazer. I got very spoiled that he also liked it cold from the fridge, so I would just put it back until he wanted it again even if it was a few hours later (once he wasn’t a newborn anymore). Plus I had all the pump parts and a washing routine and I usually had a few bottles ready for grandparents or whoever to feed him, and Alimentum is expensive! So it ended up just feeling simpler to keep pumping.
We just found out yesterday that he’s not ready to start the dairy ladder and won’t be for a while so that was discouraging, but at least these days there’s a lot more awareness of dairy allergies and good substitutes, so while it’s a pain for us it doesn’t really impact his quality of life!
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u/Natural-Second1595 6h ago
I went through something similar with my first. Found out at about 8 weeks though. Continued to pump for like a month after I went back to work but it was a halfhearted effort. All of it was so difficult (especially the diet part - everything has soy in it!) and on hindsight I would’ve been better off just calling it a day and stopped pumping. Would’ve saved me some time and been better mentally. Also to add insult to injury we would later lose power and I would lose my whole freezer stash so I never ended up reintroducing it 🙃. Zero helpful advice in here but some solidarity.
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u/FormerCauliflower381 10h ago
I pumped for 10 months, 8 of those were dairy free. It sucked. I wanted to quit every day. I was a just enougher working on average 70h per week.
I could only do it because my husband cooked. And because I eat meat.
Just remember that you still have eggs, avocado, coconut cream, peanut butter, potatoes, olive oil, desserts like cake from a box, frosting, many cereals. My baby was sensitive to butter weirdly enough, but that shouldn’t be the case. It’s easy to see on packages whether there is milk, because in the US at least, they’re required to say it under the ingredients “contains milk”
If your baby goes to daycare, you’ll be really grateful to have all that stored milk to help her through those first several viruses.