Important Supplements
Breastfeeding TED: Collection of Mamas’ Blurbs
Christine Wallace writes, January 2016 Link to page 2 Link to Main TED Page
So my TED journey now. Like most I was in desperation mode. I had incompetent docs who wouldn’t increase the dose of zantac or change meds and no guidance other than deal with a crying baby. I started off by cutting out dairy because I remembered my sister saying that dairy made my nephew fussy. We had some improvements, but not major. So I did some quick research which said to cut out soy as well. Again, no real improvement. My mom (who has severe GERD) suggested I start a food diary to see what was bothering him, but at that point there were too many variables. I did a more intense internet research and found out about the TED diet. (This was still before I knew about the awesomeness of your facebook group.) I had a hard time finding a vegetable that I could stand eating because I despise squash and zucchini. I basically went veggie free for 3 weeks and that was the first food group I tried bringing back into my diet. Thankfully, lettuce and green beans were fine. I just slowly added more food back into my diet leaving the big intolerances until last or in the case of dairy not at all. Much like with trialling new solid foods, I waited at least 3 days between new foods. In the end, our problems were dairy, soy in large quantities, eggs, berries and caffeine. We had some immediate improvements, but not full improvements until he was properly medicated. When adding egg in: try it baked in something as an ingredient first…cooked 20 minutes…then if that doesn’t work try just the egg white baked then just the yolk baked (or vice versa) then try the actual egg…He was never initially tested for blood in the stool (see above with incompetent military doctors!) and by the time we switched to a civilian ped I had been dairy free for over 2 months. We recently tried dairy and had him tested. There was no blood, but lots of screaming and mucousy diapers. So at this point he’s back to dairy free. Oh! I also put one of those calorie counting apps on my phone to make sure I was eating enough calories during the day to keep up my supply. In the beginning, it started to dip because I wasn’t eating enough calories.
Karen Fullam writes:
In my opinion, doing an extreme TED without addressing meds is like the ped taking the hard route (or rather, asking *you* to do the hard route just because ped is “uncomfortable” prescribing the needed PPI). If you feel situation is not an emergency, then sure, you can do the TED first and see how it helps, then add a med improvement. But if the situation is more desperate, I would recommend a two pronged approach: get a more appropriate med AND do the TED. You can always step back the meds (or start adding back foods) once you get a good baseline.
For rice, find the most fragrant, fancy rice you can find. Basmati or jasmine. It’s expensive, but awesome. You can salt it and add a little olive oil. I have a rice cooker, so it is so easy to make the rice.
I just saw the sun rise again and put potato in my mouth before trying to feed baby again. We are eating to live, but it is temporary and necessary.
Just yesterday, I told my husband, “I need to forget that breakfast exists,” because it is hard to get in the mentality of eating lunch/dinner food in the morning. I’ve been eating skillet fried potatoes for breakfast; haven’t found a protein yet that I’d care to eat, though turkey bacon might be something to look for?We are not in an “emergency” (FTT) situation, so I am making my own elim diet. I am down to chicken, rice, potatoes, and oats. I allow seasoning with salt, white/brown sugar, canola oil, and garlic powder. I like *good* rice (basmati) with brown sugar and salt, chicken thighs glazed with above seasonings. Sliced fried potatoes (not the healthiest, but gotta get me through). Oatmeal for breakfast. I can handle this for two weeks…. My advice–buy the most fragrant rice and take advantage of a couple of safe seasonings. Get a really good turkey breast and cook it up juicy. Whenever you get weak remember the alternative–a hurting, screaming baby.
For a snack, I eat rice chex. Salty: make a sauce of 3T canola oil, 3T apple cider vinegar, 2t garlic powder, 2t salt, and 1T sugar. Pour over a bowl of rice chex (a whole box), stir, and microwave for 60 seconds 3-4 times, stirring between. Sweet: 1C brown sugar, 3T Canola oil, 3T water, a little salt. Mix the sauce and heat in the mircowave (maybe 30s 2-3 times, stirring between). Pour over the bowl of rice chex, stir, and microwave for 60 seconds 3-4 times, stirring between. Tastes a bit like caramel corn… I am a stress eater. Few things are more stressful than a GERD baby. I make no excuses for my hypoallergenic junk food. wink emoticon But it all depends on what you “allow”. I allow sugars and canola/olive oil….”
“I tried this last night. made oat flour by food-processing oats. 1/4c oat flour, 1/4c white sugar, 1/4c water, blurb of canola oil, a pinch of salt, mixed in a mug, microwaved 1 min. Like a brownie in a mug. Tasted a little like oatmeal, but a very good little “cake.” I also food-processed white sugar to make powdered (commercial powdered has corn starch) and added a little water to make a glaze for the cake. It would be very autumn-appropriate with a little cinnamon and nutmeg. 😉
Stephie Allard
I thought I should give a TED talk 🙂 currently on week 10! It’s funny when I was on week two and another mom said she could only eat three things for 3 months I though no way will I do this that long!! And here I am 🙂 he got a couple vaccines three days ago and things have been so bad, it made me realize how good things had gotten! We were sleeping in a bed (instead of sitting up in a chair) and he was sleeping on the side of me not on me! I didn’t have to get up and walk and bounce him in the middle of the night. He stopped screaming in the car like someone was stabbing him.
A lot has changed since I found this group! I started TED 4 weeks before I started the proper dosing of OTC nexium. I saw pretty instant results from the nexium, but the diet is helping, too.
Before I started he as waking every 30-60 min all night, screaming with gas pains at 4am. Only taking 30 min naps. Pulling, twisting, fussing at the breast to the point I felt like glass was pulling through my nipples. With the diet and nexium he was sleeping 2-3 hours at night and 1 hour naps with in a week. And last week I was getting some 2-3 hour naps. Of course still while on me and usually nursing him back to sleep a couple times with in those naps.During my time on TED I also had to cut out the TED items one by one because it seemed like something was still bothering him. I only gave up potatoes last week because they were my one joy.. And darn, pretty sure it’s them! I know a food fails because he will be up every 30-60 all night when I eat it. And have gas at 4-6am. At points I don’t even know if I had a baseline I just knew I needed a new food item because I couldn’t take it. I now eat rice, chicken, sun nut butter, salmon, avocado oil, apples, pears and ahhhh strawberry jam (just added this and chicken last week!)
After 9 weeks of turkey as my main source of protein with some lamb (I stopped liking it after week one) and added salmon in a couple times a week around week 5. Oatmeal failed, beef failed, gluten free organic (soy, dairy free) chicken nuggets failed. Sometimes I need to prep myself for a new food and decide is this worth a sleepless night?? I usually try on Fridays so I don’t need to work the next day. Or I try when I just can’t take another bite of turkey! I tried quinoa but stopped wanting to eat it after three days. I’m a pretty picky eater. I add salt to everything and I never did before. I don’t like pepper.My baby is now 6 months old. (4.5 adjusted) I have no fancy recipes as I just did basic baking or grilling with avocado oil and salt. Breast feeding is super important to me, I can’t explain why. I have wondered at times if formula would be better. And maybe I will get to that point. The GI that I go to is not pushing formula at all so that’s good. (it’s just my friends and family that think I’m crazy and think formula will fix all of this) I don’t feel in my heart for me and my baby that it right for us right now. So I’m going to keep doing this for as long as I can. Plus I had some weight to lose anyway so I just keep thinking he is helping me reach my goal weight 🙂 good luck my fellow TED mamas! You can do it. I think for the first time I am finally enjoying my baby and motherhood. Things aren’t perfect, he still has mucous poop, congestion, coughing and won’t sleep without me. But I just keep telling myself baby steps.. We will get there and I will sleep again. Someday 🙂
My favorite is cut up all kinda of potatoes and cover then liberally with salt and avocado oil bake at 450 for around 45 min and see if the are soft and some will get crispy. It’s so basic there isn’t really much you can do! I pretty much eat turkey breast all day long. I guess being in diets my whole life prepared me for this.. I had gestational diabetes too.. So was on a strict diet since 11 weeks pregnant!
He is also on probiotic, went to CST, had his tongue revised at 4.5mo.I pretty much ate turkey and potatoes all day. I found an organic Hashbrowns that just had potatoes and fried them with avocado oil with salt. It was my favorite thing to eat. I looked forward to it! Then I took potatoes out because it was the one thing I did not try to exclude (poops still being mucous and still not feeling like he was 100%) and crap! I think he has a potato issue.. 🙁 I also got to the point that I stopped wanting to eat 🙁 I’m over weight so I have extra calories to burn.. My supply didn’t suffer, it was actually just the reflux making him fussy at the breast. You can do this!! I added in sun nut butter after 5 weeks and ate that on rice cakes that was a good breakfast .. It’s what I eat now that I can’t have potatoes. 🙂
At five weeks she wrote:
Yeah hop on my train! Choo choo! I cook a turkey breast ( got sick of ground turkey ) cut up potatoes and roast them with avocado oil. I’ve tried taking out lamb, rice and potatoes too see if it made a difference. I switched to quinoa.. But tonight was weak and ate potatoes again frown emoticon. I ate organic rice cakes that are just rice, now I have added sunnut butter.. I eat it by the spoonful .. Chicken failed, pretty much went four weeks on the basic TED. But got sick of lamb after a week, and got lazy with zucchini.. At first I liked ground lamb, rice and zucchini dish.. It all becomes worth it when you see you baby feeling better!! But really the right PPI made the most difference! On week 7 of TED.. Ate salmon tonight 🙂 hopeful I get to sleep.
I am on it right now it’s almost been five weeks. I’m down to eating rice potatoes turkey and pears. Added sunnutbutter in and that seems to be doing OK to. I was already off dairy, soy, gluten, and eggs long before I started TED. I would say it did help a little I was doing it for his gas issues. Now I’m realizing the gas and reflex kind of went hand-in-hand. I agree with Christine, getting him properly medicated has made more of a difference in a shorter amount of time. I’m wishing I would’ve probably medicated him first. Because now I’m stuck eating such a limited amount of food and I’m afraid to add anything back in. I know for sure he has a dairy soy and gluten intolerance, because he kept having blood in his stool when I was eating those things.
Leslie Y. writes:
Food diary is key. I check his ph a few times a day & keep track of what I eat along with notes on his mood/fussiness & poop. I knew bananas bothered him & I read that avocado (which I’d been eating daily) has a similar protein structure and often babies that react to one will be bothered by the other. Even on a TED of just millet, pear, squash, & Turkey – something was still bothering him. So I cut out the grain to see if we saw improvement. I tried eliminating dairy first since that’s the most common culprit. Then I took out major irritants/allergens: nuts, eggs, soy, gluten, red meat. When that didn’t work, I switched to the TED approach & am working my way to rebuild my ‘okay’ food list. It takes about 7 days to know positive improvement from eliminating something (dairy being the longest at 2-3 weeks for us). It was easiest to just start with the basics & add in from there. 3 days with no reaction & the food moves to my “okay” list and we try something else new. I also had to take a hard look at my supplements. Because his ph was sooo acidic, we cut out slippery elm bark extract (replacing with aloe juice) and gas drops since both of those were slightly acidic themselves. Finally, I had to switch to an allergen free probiotic and cut out my raw foods vitamin supplements since some of the whole food sources for those vitamins were veggies I know are irritants.
I do pear & Turkey cold cuts…or I just have “dinner” for breakfast. On a good day, I can get away with turkey bacon or turkey sausage.
I bought ph strips from Earth Fare (about $15 for a roll) [like this] . You tear off a small piece & stick it in baby’s mouth for a few seconds to get it wet. There is a key on the roll that allows you to know the ph level from the color the strip turns. Normal is about 7. His was 4.5 the first time we measured it. In trying to improve our situation, my first focus was healing my gut health by taking quality, allergen-free probiotics. My ph is now a perfect 7. My breastmilk also measures a 7. I measure my saliva & breastmilk both for mine & saliva/spit up for baby. This means that what is going into him is a perfect ph balance but his little system us reacting negatively to something and he is overproducing acid…so his body’s ph is out of whack. I can see patterns between eating something that is an irritant (i.e. avocado) & a subsequent drop in his ph and increase in fussiness (meaning more gas, doesn’t want to be put down, squirmy, etc…)
There are obviously a lot of reasons a baby could have reflux…structural issues, swallowing air during feeding, a high palate due to tongue tie, food irritants, poor gut population from a C-section or antibiotic administration during labor/delivery, etc… We took a multifaceted approach to his healing. He’s on a probiotic. He’s been worked on by a chiropractor & CST to address structural issues. We’ve had his tongue & lip ties revised & worked with an IBCLC to ensure his latch is good. We’ve done palate exercises to allow him to re-learn appropriate tongue movement & ensure his palate is being stimulated properly to trigger his digestion response. At this point, we have been cleared as good to go in all areas other than his ph level. Because we know the breastmilk he’s drinking is ph balanced, it’s a negative reaction his tummy is having to that food which is our biggest lingering issue. I can see a direct correlation between certain foods & the severity of his reflux symptoms. Normally a negative response occurs within 24 hrs. If nothing negative occurs writhing 3 days, we consider it ‘safe’. I just have to introduce one new food at a time to ensure I can easily identify the culprit if we have a negative reaction.
Crystal K. writes:
I didn’t do full TED because we couldn’t do rice, but took down what I was eating to just a few items to get a baseline. What worked and didn’t work was determined by diaper color and mucous quantity and babies overall mood. Reflux got better as offending foods eliminated. We are dairy, soy, corn, rice, oats, rice, legume, and but free. I cannot eat gluten, coconut, sweet potato, and hemp.
How I knew no rice: Baby’s poop turned brown and all mucous. It backed her up for more than 24 hours when she is a first thing of the day pooper. She also would be up all night screaming. We eliminated it for near a month and even the smallest trials brought back the pain and bad diapers. I was originally going to do ted but it became clear early that rice had to go.
I focus on what I can eat and every time I see my baby smile I am reminded why I am doing this. We have not successfully added anything back in. Some fruit I am eating is bothering the baby, but no idea what, and at this point since she is teething we are just going with it.I used whole foods 365 California extra virgin olive oil. A lot of olive oils can have soy and other oils. Be sure to find vegan wines if you drink.
Prepare many meals at once. Huge time saver to cook 6 chicken breasts for a few days worth of meals than trying to do it every meal or even once a day.
Whatever works for you. I found early that rice is a big no for us and I cannot do sweet potatoes. You need to find chicken with nothing added. A lot of frozen chicken has soy…
TED is helpful to find what works because you have so few things that it’s easier to pinpoint what isn’t working. The goal is to add more foods to your diet.
I was really surprised how flavorful food can be without spice. I kept accusing my husband of using butter on the chicken because it has such a great flavor, but it was just the olive oil and a little salt. For us, chicken was easier than turkey. I think the TED diet can be tailored to what works for you. The books that are typically started are supposed to be low risk, but for us rice didn’t work. I think it is most important that you are starting with just the handful of foods so you can get a good baseline established.
Mary D. writes:
I also only used 365 extra virgin olive oil and avoided canola. After three months I have now added coconut oil and my daughter has done great on it. I only used sea salt and pepper on everything in the beginning – mostly chicken, ground turkey thigh (made meatballs with just turkey olive oil salt and pepper), cut up roasted potatoes, pear, banana, and avacado. I tried salmon really early on and she did fine on that which added a lot of nutrition to my diet. I cut all vitamins as i noticed she reacted to those. I drank fennel tea or ginger tea (she seemed to react to chamomile). Now have successfully added in cumin, garlic, butternut squash, limited gluten ( bread from bakery that has no additives) almonds, berries, oatmeal, and lamb. Eggs caused green poop so still off those along with dairy and soy. Its hard in beginning but you can do it!! You will crave things but after a while you just adjust! I had a few cries over missing certain food but now adding so much back in week by week. Also try things a few times as sometimes a flare up could be a growth spurt or something other than food. Good luck!!
Kristin K. writes:
TED was tough but totally worth it to see the improvement in my daughter’s reflux, gas, poops and even baby acne.
I would add a new food in every week or so and monitor symptoms (mainly baby’s temperament and stool quality). I survived for many months on fruits, vegetables, rice and quinoa. Easy? No! Worth it? Totally! Dairy was the final food I added and waited till 12 months to do so. We’re still nursing at 15 months and we’re both able to eat anything now!
Also, an unexpected bonus to the TED was how great I felt. I’ve had a lot of digestive issues myself, and while on the TED they all but disappeared and I had so much energy. Yes, energy…with a reflux baby and two other kiddos!
Christine C. writes:
Have you thought about eliminating top 8 and seeing if that helps? It is rough to say the least but you could try it and see if it helps at all. If he improves, then you could slowly add back in a food group a single ingredient at a time (i.e. Milk or egg or peanuts) to see if he’s ok with it or if it sets him off again? I ended up on a corn/soy/dairy/peanut/tree nut/coconut/latex food/wheat/fish/meat (I might be missing some) diet for 2.5 years for my son. It sucked. I literally had about 8 specific food items that I could eat including salt. But we made it through and he went from FTT and 0% on the growth curve to 30% – and not miserable! Hugs! It *will* get better!!
Jill Horigan Faunce writes:
I didn’t do the official TED’s. From birth I avoided dairy and soy and legumes because of my first two kids. Hidden ingredients and all. And he slept in my arms sitting in a recliner. I did this for six months. Ultimately I had to avoid: dairy, soy, poultry, all grains except buckwheat and sorghum, sweet potatoes, bananas, all nuts, tapioca, legumes… I think that’s it. I ate like a 1950s farmer. Beef and pork and eggs, white potatoes, basic salads, etc. My diet really came down to trial and error. Our journey started when my third MFPI and reflux baby turned 6 mos and doctor recommended solids. He was on zegerid at this point. He failed apples, sweet potatoes, and bananas horribly. Inconsolable screaming for days with bloody mucousy stools – worse than any reflux flare I had been through with my others. Saw an allergist who immediately suspected FPIES. His traditional skin prick allergy tests were all negative. He then did a patch test, which yielded some results. I eliminated all those positive things from my diet and then just went from there. Rice was off the list at that point and then it became totally obvious that chicken was bad. For that reason I never did the more common TED. I just stuck with what I called my farmer diet and when he had a big flare I would scour my diet to see what I had eaten the day prior. And usually would test again to see if I was right. There is a babycenter message board group for FPIES parents that I found very helpful in knowing what foods were more likely to be safe for him. His diagnosis was FPIES and GERD but his reactions were of the chronic variety. I did that until I weaned him at 3. And promptly gained about 25 lbs with the reintroduction of grains and dairy.
Amy Estill Schmidt [Baby] flat out refused anything else [other than breastmilk]. SO much better after cutting out Dairy, but I also had to cut out eggs, soy and nuts.
