Need Help with Rotation Diet!

Try visiting vegweb.com. It's a vegan site with lots of info for avoiding dairy. MANY MANY delicious recipes. You will have to sift through to eliminate other allergies, but you should find lots of stuff that is acceptable.

Have you had your boys checked for celiac. It means you are allergic to gluten. Often you can have many other allergies until you go off the gluten and give your intestines time to heal. I am a celiac for almost 2 yrs now. The diet can be hard but definately worth it. Good luck!

A.

C., I don't know if this will be helpful to you if rotation is your only option, but I wanted to share what I have done with my kids. Both have numerous sensitivities (18 or so different foods each) and a few allergies. I only rotate those foods that give my children the overload response you mentioned. Otherwise, it is too complicated to successfully rotate each food for each child. So, I bought both of them a package of different colored round stickers. One child is orange, one is green. Each food that is safe for my "orange" child gets an orange sticker. Same for the "green" child. I have a posted list of rotated foods (you could even mark the stickers on those foods, I suppose); every other food is fair game any day. Also, each child has a shelf in the cupboard and section of the refrigerator. That, combined with the sticker system makes it easy to tell one kid's foods from the other's. My children are young--3 and almost 6, but we have taught them to only eat foods that have the appropriate sticker. Some foods might even have both color stickers if it is a food they can both have, but in order to eat it, that food MUST have their particular color. Spaghetti is not as simple at my house because I have to make 3 different types of noodles; We have 4 different types of "milks" in the frig; 3 different types of breads; 2 of us eat eggs, one eats only egg whites, one gets egg substitute; etc, etc.! So far, so good though. We haven't had to use the Epi-Pen and have limited night terrors, temper tantrums, insomnia, and lethargy or hyperactivity since implementing this system. Both kids look and act healthy and are much more cheerful. Good luck. I wish you success; it's not an easy task!

C.~
A. here and WOW! Nice to meet another mom and family we have much in common with! My sons (3) all have various allergies (food and airborne). I also have done a lot of reading and trying out rotation diets. I have found that for my oldest(11) his rotation is different, more like 7 days for dairy and as he has gotten older his tolerence has grown. However, my 8 yr old is still very dairy intolerent and can only handle about 1 item every 10 days or so. I know how you feel and have had many parents look at me like I am making this up and putting my issues on my children. Keep trying, for a long time you are going to feel like a short order cook just to handle everyones needs. Here is one day for us.

Sunday-- Breakfast, Wheat(gluten)free cereal with rice milk
sausage and/or bacon, snacktime - 1/2 of a fruit for the older two and crackers gluten free for the 3yr old, lunch- hotdogs and beans or veggies like carrots, snack- the older two have meat slices, water Dinner time is often a protein like fish, meat then mashed potatoes and lettuce. Dessert is rice dream ice cream with some crazy topping and non dairy whipped cream.

This is really hard to control when they are outside the house or with relatives that do not think that it is true but you are the one who has to deal with the middle of the night scream of pain from gas and intestial pain. I have been there FAR too often. My sister did not believe me until she took my 2 sons on an trip to California without me. Stuart(oldest) called me two hours after they left and said that his stomach hurt and he wanted to come home. I asked him what he ate and he told me when they left that she took them to DQ on their way out of town. An hour or so later she called me and said that he had the runs and had puked in the car. It was her own fault and I told her so. She didn't doubt me again after Russell(middle) got sick that night from the cheeseburger she told him he could have. UGH- long trip from hell for all of them. Anyways, I really feel for you and understand. My 3yr old son has just been diagnosed with an allergy to fruit. Please feel free to contact me any time.
~A. Niedzwiecki, Bend, OR
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my first question would be if you all have been tested for Gluten allergy, or Celiac. With this particular "allergy" your own body attachs the Celia (little hairs of the intestine) that digest the food. I found that after we (my son & I, but not my daughter) were gluten free, (about 3 weeks,) I could eat other foods I thought I was allergic too.
Celia.com is a great reference, but a pediatrician, or gastro enterologist can test you using a simple blood test these days. If you want, you can go gluten free, & see how you feel, (that web site will show you how.) An interesting thing about this one is that the lactase needed to digest the dairy is at the tip of the celia, and the first part to be lost. so the first symptom of celiac, is often the inability to digest dairy products.
Sounds like a diet heavy on veggies, fruit, and some protien thrown in, would suit you well.

I respect & honor your commitment to "feed your kids right" It's a major adjustment to how you live. I encourage you it's worth it.
A.

I have a rediculous number of food sensitivities myself, but through trial and error have found the most offensive, and as you mention, if I can stay away from those, then the secondary 'allergy' foods don't bother me nearly so much. I would simplify your life by simply avoiding the allergen foods. There are many dairy free cookbooks which should get you along way.

If it makes you feel any better, my main food allergies are: yeast (in all it's forms which means no alcohol, vinegar, breads, anything with nutritional yeast, etc.), milk (in all it's forms, no matter from what animal source), sugar and corn (including corn syrup)- all of which are in almost everything. believe it or not, I do find foods I can eat, though I end up making nearly everything from scratch. Luckily, I enjoy cooking.

C.,
I was first introduced to the rotation diet 14 years ago. At that time it was only three days of rotation, not four. Reading your children's allergies/intolerences sounds just like me. I also have allergies to eggs and more, which make things worse. Fortunately, I am able to tolerate Goat yogurt and Goat cheese so that gives me a great variety. (New Seasons has a vanilla flavor goat yogurt that I like.)Since I can't have mayonaise, I avoided tuna salad for 13 yrs. Here's what I do now, I use two cans of white albacore tuna rinsed very well to get out most of the nitrates. I add 1 6oz Redwood Hill Farm plain yogurt. Then I add some sweet pickle relish to sweeten it up, and that's my tuna salad. I eat it without bread.
Since we have different allergies/intolerences in our family, we have different types of "milk". My husband drinks soy, our youngest son and myself drink rice and our oldest doesn't drink any because he doesn't like any of it.
After 14yrs, I have decided not to do any rotation diet because like you said you are trying so hard not to OD on a particular food. I eat what sounds good at that moment as long as it isn't a reactive food.
Suggestion: Go see a naturopathic and get a blood food allergy test for all of your kids to find out what food is most offensive. Omit that item for a couple of weeks. What you will find is that that one food was causing the secondary intolerences. (I haven't had eggs for over 14yrs, but everytime I'm tested, it still reads off the scale. pretty amazing.)
With more than one person having allergies/intolerences with different foods, there is never going to be an easy meal preparation. In our house I have to constantly remind my husband not to use cow cheese when he makes a grilled cheese sandwich for our youngest. The great thing is that he only likes the Goat cheese and can't stand the other. Things taste funny at first, but you get used to them especially when it is what your life will be like. Children adapt great so don't worry.
Go with the Naturopathic blood testing, not the scratch testing that most pediatricians do. I've had those and they aren't worth the paper their written on. Naturopaths are really good with helping rotation diets and food alternatives.
Quinoa is a really good grain that is considered a complete protein. We eat it hot or cold like a taboule salad without the offending grain. I also use it to replace pasta in spaghetti. E-mail me back if you would like advice on cooking it.
With multiple allergies/intolerences it is difficult, but you will get through it. Believe me; from someone who has been there and will be for the rest of my life, you will.
I wish you the best health for your children.
-A.

My youngest has food allergies. he is allergic to dairy egg and peanut. We just avoid those foods all together. I do alot of stir frying. Not alot of things like casaroles because its too hard to make something he can have. I do stews, roasts. Anythiing like that. I have made a recipie for pancakes that the whole family loves. Hope it might work for you,
2 very ripe bananas
1 14 oz can of coconut milk
put these in the blender and puree before mixing them with the following
1 1/2 C of flour
1 Tblsp Baking powder
1/3 c oil
1 Tbsp Sugar
sometimes I will add cinamon or something like that too. One time i only had on Banana so I used about 2/3 c of canned pinapple pureed witht he banana. It was really good too. The whole family, even my husband likes them. We usually have it for Dinner one night every week or two. Its Breakfast for dinner night. The kids adore it. You are welcome to contact me if you want any other cooking ideas. I do it for a living so I have been able to work a few things out over the years.
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J.

C.,

I just wanted to encourage you. I am in the same boat. I just recently discovered that I have food allergies that I never knew about. I am in the process of changing over my cupboards and finding new recipes and editing my old.

I too have gone to the library. I really liked the Food Allerby Cookbook by Marilyn Giovannini. I also liked What to EAt When You Can't Eat Anything by Chupi and Luke Sweetman. This one has a lot of fun recipes that don't seem too weird. These two books don't necessarily outline a rotation diet, but they do have good recipes.

My advice about the rotation diet is to plan out the week or month. Use the books you have to plan breakfast lunch and dinner. Have this be an assignment the boys help you with. That will make it fun for them and help you.

I've joined a couple of Yahoo groups that I can give you links for if you are interested. Two are focused on GFCF (Gluten Free, Casien Free). The other is just a Food Lab for people with various food restrictions. Encouraging advice and tasty recipes are offered.

Please e-mail me if you need encouragement or have questions. I may not have answers, but I will listen and do my best.

Hi C.. It's great that you homeschool. It makes it easier to control what your kids are eating.

You might want to try simply avoiding the allergenic foods at home. That way, when you go out or are eating at someone else's house, your kids are free to eat whatever they want, since there is none of the offending food already in their system and they are less likely to react. It gives you a little more leeway when you are away from home and your children want to eat what everyone else is having.

Milk is especially difficult to avoid but since your children have secondary allergies, they may be able to have butter which is mostly fat and has less of the allergenic protein.

Hi, I don't have a rotation diet for you, but I have had allergies and found NAET (N...someones name allerergy elimination treatment)really effective. I am just realiing my 3 yr old may have allergies so I am taking him to a NAET appt this month to nail down what he has and actually GET RID of the allergy!! I had really bad allergies that constantly made me feel sick and no one could put their finger on it and I tried all sorts of wierd diets and nothing helped until I did NAET. It is a holistic natural treatment so I don't know if you are willing to try it, but I did it with no hope and it WORKED!! I was shocked. I only wished I had found it sooner. Just thought you might like to know. Hope it helps. K.

Are you familiar with NAET? Nambudripad's Allergy Elimination Technique is the full name. It is a treatment for allergies and in my experience with my own kids it works well. My children's allergies were not as severe as your kids' but I have a friend with a severe allergies to peanuts that was treated with NAET and now she can actually eat peanuts! Look it up online naet.com. Good luck!