Corn and my baby
WARNING: graphic baby poop talk ahead. Proceed with caution.
When my second daughter was born, I expected the normal newborn poop of a breastfed baby - mustard yellow, curd-like and sweet-smelling. This never happened for her. Her poop was, shall we say, a bit on the foul side: brown, sometimes with black streaks, mucus-y, and smelly. I knew something was not right and kept hoping it would change, but it only got worse. Clearly there was something going on with her digestive system. She sometimes had a lot of gas, which I know people think is normal for babies, but my first baby had no gas, so I wasn’t going to accept it in this one. I had to figure out what was causing her tummy distress. She also had little hives/rash on her neck and behind her ears. During night feedings, she would sometimes take 45 minutes to go back to sleep. She just didn’t calm down quickly. At times I wondered if I had a “colicky” baby.
I decided to investigate my diet. I was already gluten-free. I then went off dairy as that is a common allergen, but no significant change happened. What was I eating a lot of that could be a potential allergen? I ate a lot of corn - could that be it? I ate tortilla chips every day and a lot of them. I also ate corn tamales and corn tortillas. I did a search on the web to see if other people had any experience with corn and newborns but found nothing. I decided to do my own test and stop eating corn. Lo and behold, within days, my 2 month old baby stopped having gas. She stopped having bowel movements as frequently and the poop? Not dark and smelly anymore! Her skin cleared up, and the best part of all was that she calmed down at night and went right back to sleep after her feedings.
There is still no corn in my diet or hers. I did test my theory and ate corn one time - her stool changed and her rash came back. I am hoping that she will not be sensitive to corn as she gets older, but I will proceed with caution. I hope that this little anecdote helps a mom out there searching for an answer.
Filed under: Babies & Kids, Corn Allergy
I am floored by what I just read in your post, that is my experience word for word(with regard to the poopie).
Our baby boy was diagnosed with failure to thrive, he was just 6.4 lbs at 2 and a half months old. After a great deal of time attempting to continue breastfeed, could see something was still very wrong. I, at my doctor’s behest, did a several day trial of formula with him. It was nearly immediate that his poopie started to look normal. I am so sad to think that I might have been able to keep breastfeeding him, as I had with our other two children, if I had only seen your post sooner.
We are still in the process of researching what is going on with him. They want to test him for celiac disease.
Thanks for sharing your experience,
Take Care.
Bekahmomofthree,
I think that the poop experience can signal an intolerance/allergy to anything. It requires detective work to figure it out sometimes, which can be extremely difficult when you are breastfeeding. I understand your regret about not being able to breastfeed, but you were doing what was best for your baby at that time. Yes, if you or your doctor had been more aware of the effects of the mother’s diet on the baby, maybe decisions would have been made differently. Motherhood is hard enough without this added stress!
I do think that your child should be tested for celiac, especially with the failure to thrive, but be aware that test results are not 100% accurate.
Alison
Good for you for figuring this out and sticking with it! According to my mother, I was also like this when I was a baby. She says I was “a very smelly baby”. After taking me off almost all common food allergens I was fine, and the doctors told my family that the food allergies would go away as I grew. Strangely, as teen and young adult I was obsessed with organic corn chips and would eat them almost every day. I didn’t think my digestive problems were caused by this, after all, my food allergies went away, right? Wrong, even thoughI was eating healthy vegan organic foods I still had stomach and kidney problems that went away after I met and was inspired by a vegan girl who was off corn and gluten and feeling much much better for it. Now I can tell if my food has hidden corn or gluten ingredients in it, my stomach starts burning almost instantly. And apparently all those years off eating food I couldn’t digest very well does cause damamge to the stomach. So keep that lil’ girl off the corn for as long as you can!
Scorchie,
Thanks for your story. It seems like corn sensitivity is growing like many other foods are. Since I was off of corn for about a year, I have eased back into eating it. I am not sure if I am sensitive or not yet.