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April 22, 2004
April 22, 2004
Collin - 2 years, 9 months old.
Ireland - 4 months, 9 days old.
One of the most important things I’d like document from Ireland’s babyhood would be our nursing relationship. Ireland nursed like a champ moments after birth. She latched on and nursed for 30 minutes. Our entire hospital stay she nursed and nursed and nursed. No real problems. Our first night at home was torture on my breasts. Ireland was still latching on great but I was so sore so I was in lots of pain each time she would nurse. I don’t think I had the latch quite right either, making things doubly painful. To give myself a little break, I started giving her expressed milk via bottle. I just needed a little healing time - or so I thought. I should have known better. A day or two soon turned into a week or two and even though I was still putting her to the breast a couple times a day, I was mainly pumping and giving her expressed milk. Even though I had the inconvenience of storing breast milk, labeling it and cleaning bottles, I found it very convenient to not be the only one feeding Ireland. It was nice that Mark could take a feeding or two and that I could go out and run a few errands or grocery shop without having to worry about breast feeding. My little girl was still getting all the benefits since she was getting 100% breast milk. At one point, when she was about 6 weeks old, I tried to get her to take the breast exclusively but it was a no go since she was used to the bottle already. I fought with myself back and forth over this, went though the guilt and the sadness, but told myself that if I was willing to put forth the time and energy it took to exclusively pump so she would still be getting breast milk, then I really shouldn’t be beating myself up. So, I pumped every three to four hours and was able to build up a huge stockpile. I froze between 15-20 bags (4-6 oz each) and then had about 20-25 bags stored in the refrigerator for immediate use. This went on for months. Pumping was starting to wear me down. I was sleep deprived, taking care of a newborn and an active and needy toddler plus double pumping every three to four hours. I would try to pump before the kids woke up or while they were napping or while they were at least content. I could pump from beginning to end in 25 minutes. Collin got so used to it, he would say, "Are you going to pump?" or "Are you pumping for sissy again, mommy?" My supply kept up, even though I was only using the hand held Avent Isis. I used that for 2 months. I can hardly believe that. Then my supply started to drop so I rented a hospital grade pump for 50.00 a month. No so cost effective, but I still knew I wanted Ireland to have only breast milk for as long as possible. It became an obsession with me. I loved the feeling that I was the only one supplying my beautiful cherub her nutrients. That, I alone, was responsible for her growth and plumpness. As much as dreaded pumping at times, I loved looking in the refrigerator and seeing all those bags of beautiful milk - I was definitely proud of myself. That alone was enough to keep me going.
Everything was running smoothly and I had a pretty good pumping schedule going, when Ireland started breaking out. It started out on just her cheeks, back of her head and elbows. It looked like dry skin with a little redness to it. I thought that maybe the soap I was bathing her with was causing her to dry out, so I switched soaps. The rash didn’t go away and started creeping up on other areas like her fingers. I put some A & D ointment on the bad areas and kept her lotioned up. That did nothing and the rash spread to her stomach, legs and forehead and got really mean looking so I made her an appointment. Ireland’s pediatrician suspected eczema caused by a milk allergy. Since I was exclusively pumping for her the only cause he could think of would be the dairy in my diet. He told me to stop eating dairy and see if that cleared things up. He also gave us a prescription for some heavy duty steroid ointment to put on the really angry looking areas and told me to keep her skin wet looking and slippery with Eucerin lotion. The back of her head, elbows and face where the worst. They were crusted over with yellowish scales. All along, I thought she just had really bad cradle cap. I felt stupid for not knowing
The ointment worked wonders and cleared up her eczema fast. But my dilemma was not so much her skin condition anymore, but my milk supply. The 22 bags of milk I had in the refrigerator for immediate use was full of dairy. This meant that I’d have no more stockpile and I’d have to start fresh. I was only producing about 3-4 oz per side by this time and Ireland was up to at least 4oz per feeding. I knew that she would need more than I could produce. I think I kept up with her for a day or two but then needed some form of supplement. I took the milk I had and put it in the freezer, hoping Ireland could take it at a later date. It made me so sad knowing I had a huge amount of breast milk sitting in the freezer and here I was, mixing formula for my baby. I have absolutely nothing against formula but I worked so hard for the breast milk I had, that I was cringing knowing I couldn’t use it.
I mixed up some Enfamil Lipil with Iron for Ireland but she wouldn’t drink it. She snarled up her nose, gagged and cried. She screamed and screamed and I just couldn’t get her to drink any. I finally thawed out some breast milk and gave her a bit to settle her down. Then I got her to drink 1oz of the Enfamil. A couple hours later, she broke out in welts all over her legs. That’s when I realized that DUH! Regular formula is milk based. I continued giving her what I could pump and got some Enfamil Lipil Prosobee with Iron. Again it was a battle to get her to take any. I had to mix mostly breast milk with just an ounce of soy. Each feeding I would increase the soy until she took a full 4oz. She tolerated the soy well for a week. Then the rash came back but not as bad. I called the ped’s office and he then suggested we put her on a 100% hypoallergenic formula, like Nutramigen. I happily ran out and purchase a 16oz can of powdered Nutramigen for the steep price of $20.00. At this point I would spend almost any amount of money on the right type of food to keep my girl from breaking out.
I had to go the same route with the Nutramigen as I did with the soy. I had to mix it with breast milk until she would drink a full 4oz. Turns out that she will ONLY drink the Nutramigen cold. She won’t even consider it if it’s warm or cool, it has to be ice cold. The stuff gags me just mixing it. The best way to describe how it smells is by saying it smells just like a bag of McDonalds french fries. Even before I said anything, Mark said that Ireland smelled like French fries. Of course I’m used to it now and don’t even smell it on her when I pick her up or when she spits up.
Well, the Nutramigen seemed to work for a few weeks but the rash crept up again. I was still using the steroid cream whenever the rash reared it’s ugly head and it would take care of it immediately. I just couldn’t figure out what could be causing the flair ups so I called the ped’s office again. He told me to continue cutting out the diary and also start cutting out all peanuts and soy. I was still avoiding all dairy from my diet (to which I lost 5 pounds thankyouverymuch!) but add that to now cutting out soy and peanuts and I was left with nothing to eat. I’m a vegetarian and soy and dairy are huge parts of my diet, especially soy. I figured that it could be anything in my diet and decided to make the choice to stop pumping all together. I thought it might be easier to find the culprit of Ireland’s allergy if she were only getting one type of food source. So over the next week I weaned myself and stopped pumping. It was a hard choice, but I think at 3.5 months I was ready. To some long term breast feeding moms, that seems like just a drop in the bucket, but for me, it seemed like forever. Mind you I was exclusively pumping, not breast feeding. I gave my baby the most I could and gave her the antibodies and important nutrients she needed for the first few months of her life. I would have gladly pumped for her for as long as humanly possible if we weren’t trying to play this guessing game. I would venture to say that most people in my situation would have given up long ago when they realized that breast feeding wasn’t going to work out.
So, to bring you up to date. Ireland is 4 months old and she’s on Nutramigen. She eats about 28-32oz per day and will still only eat it ice cold, which actually works out because there is no waiting for formula to warm up. She’s a very impatient baby anyway.
The eczema still pops up once in awhile and we just aren’t sure what is causing it. I’ve changed all of our laundry soap and dryer sheets to All-free or Pyrex-free and I no longer even bathe her with any kind of soap. Her pediatrician said that it just might be the type of skin she has and she’ll probably grow out of it. He suggested we still use the steroid cream only for the really mean looking parts of the rash and then he prescribed some Ellidel cream for the mild flair ups. He said that mostly likely it’s not a food type allergy since she’s on the Nutramigen and still breaking out (not as bad though) so he said that we could try soy again to see how she tolerates it. If she breaks out again badly, then she’ll be back on Nutramigen until at least 6 months. Then we’ll reassess and see what we need to do at that point.
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