experiences with NAET/Bioset/NMT for allergies

When I first discovered that Nathaniel had allergies, and started telling people about that, about three people came out of the blue and told me to look into NAET, an alternative therapy for things like allergies. I said I would look into it, and I kind of halfheartedly did, but not really.

Then, my parents' exchange student of sorts told me about how the modality cured her of gluten intolerance, and I thought--perhaps now is the time. I will find a practitioner and see what's up.

I found a lady about half an hour away who practices NMT with elements of NAET and Bioset. She said that helping Nathaniel would probably take 4 sessions, with a cost of about $160 for the first session and then $80 for subsequent sessions. I decided that if Nathaniel's allergies could be cured for that, it would be worth it--and if not, well, at least we tried.

The lady said she could do it over the phone, or in person. Uh. I told her I was more comfortable in person, so we made the trek last week.

It was pretty fascinating. At first she used me as a proxy for Nathaniel, doing muscle testing on me to discern the issue. When Nathaniel went crazy (he got very agitated during the therapy), she used herself as a proxy. After the session was over, the baby went from being agitated to being super, super tired, even though he'd only gotten up from a nap like an hour before. He just cuddled into me and was so tired. The practitioner warned that he could be very very weird for the next day while his body reset, and that he may have allergic reactions to nothing as his body figures out what he is and isn't allergic to.

Well, lo and behold, I got home from the appointment, and when I pulled him out of the carseat, he had hives, even though he obviously had not been exposed to anything abnormal. He had hives on his face. A few hours later, he developed a bunch of hives on his arm. Meanwhile, he swung from being super insane crazy, to being tired and cranky and lethargic until I put him to bed. His bowel movements were a weird color that night.

So even though all this lady did was muscle testing on her own self, basically, and talking, it made an actual difference.

Yesterday we had a follow-up appointment, which we did over the phone. I figured, if she wasn't touching him anyway, I didn't want to drive half an hour for it.

It was super weird--Nathaniel woke up from his nap at her call, and started to fuss as she started to access his energy (or whatever). So I nursed him. Well, no sooner had he latched on (in silence) than on the phone the practitioner said, "Uhoh! You're in the way! I can't access his energy because your field is in the way."

As she said that, Nathaniel unlatched, and as soon as he did that, she was like, "Oh, never mind."

That happened twice more during the appointment: first, when he started to get agitated again and I nursed him (she said she couldn't access him because I was in the way, and then when I unlatched him she noted that something had changed), and when he was still very upset about whatever and wanted me to hold him. When I picked him up, she lost connection with him, or got overwhelmed by a connection with me or something, that cleared up when I put him down. All three times, well, it was obviously over the phone so it's not like she could see what was happening, and I didn't tell her. So that was weird.

She noted during the phone call that Nathaniel's energy felt "loopy." Sure enough, he was atypically strange during the call: walking around aimlessly, falling down on his bum, wandering around kind of strangely. Loopy is a good word for that.

Anyway, after the appointment, she said that he would be weird for the next 24 hours while he sorted things out--his poop was weird again last night, and he was SO CLINGY UGH. So so clingy. He wept at dinnertime because I tried to put him in his booster seat--we sit next to each other. I kept my arm around him. In the end his conniption was such that I just pulled him out of the seat and held him on my lap while I ate. I haven't had to do that for... months and months.

Also at dinner, my mother gave him a bite of carrots that she didn't know were cooked with butter. In the past, just for reference, the amount of milk in an M&M--Nathaniel could lick an eighth of an M&M and get hives all over his face.

He ate those buttered carrots and didn't even get a single hive.

So, so far so good, I guess. Bizarre, right? But if it works, it works...

allergen-free chicken cordon bleu casserole

My family voted to have chicken cordon bleu casserole for dinner this week.

Sadly, I'm not supposed to have dairy! And dairy plays a huge role in chicken cordon bleu. So I had to come up with a solution.

Here is that solution.

First, the regular recipe is: you bread chicken cubes by dipping them in a mixture of egg and milk, and then in bread crumbs. You fry them. Then you mix them in a casserole dish with 8 oz cubed ham, 8 oz cubed swiss cheese, and 1 10.5-oz can of cream of chicken soup mixed with 10.5 oz of milk. Bake at 350 for 40 minutes.

So, clearly, since Nathaniel is allergic to eggs and dairy, this was going to involve some work on my part.

For the cream of chicken soup, I used this recipe and it turned out admirably. It made approximately 4x as much as I needed (I made us a mini-batch of dairy-free casserole), so I froze the rest in serving-size bags for the next time I need dairy-free cream of chicken.

I dipped the chicken in straight up coconut milk to bread it; the breading didn't stick to the chicken like I wanted it to, but it worked out in the end.

We used fresh local goat swiss cheese instead of regular swiss cheese, since we discovered on Saturday that the little man can handle goat cheese.

I made our special casserole in a bread pan, and baked it at the regular time.

Actually, I think our casserole turned out better than the normal one. I don't love goat cheese, but it worked out really well for the chicken cordon bleu!

adjusting to allergies

When the allergist told me that I would need to give up dairy, egg, and peanut because Nathaniel was allergic to them and I was nursing, I initially thought he was crazy. It would not have been the first time I had received gross misinformation about breastfeeding from the allopathic community. So I spent the weekend still eating eggs and butter and cheese, and researching a million things on breastfeeding kids with allergies.

Alas, the allergist was correct. I SHOULD eliminate those foods from my diet. Here are some helpful links that led me to that conclusion.

La Leche League on Allergies and the Breastfeeding Baby
Random page where someone asks about dairy allergies in relation to breastfeeding

And the most helpful one of all that I need to keep handy for reference, Life without milk! And other things. This website has a list of food you can still eat that doesn't have dairy in it. SO HELPFUL!

Now, to make my new dietary issues even more superfun, I've been feeling very strongly in the past month that I need to give up sugar. In college, I did this once for Lent, and cut out everything with sugar in the top 5 ingredients. It was awesome. After breaking the addiction to sugar, that is. That took a good two weeks. But after that, it was great. I felt great, lost weight, and basically my body was just happy.

But back then, when I couldn't just have a granola bar for breakfast or something, I would have eggs (out!) or a peanut butter sandwich (also out!). Now my options are much more limited. I'm discovering that I need to plan all my meals ahead of time, to be sure they don't involve any ingredients I am trying to avoid.

I told Carl last night that I didn't want to be That Person who goes out with other people and has really crazy dietary needs that are practically impossible to fulfill.

"You already are that person," Carl told me, not because I'm super picky or something (I'm not), but because as of Friday, I guess I AM that person. For Nathaniel, I have to be that person.

allergist times

I took Nathaniel to the allergist yesterday. He was a champion for the nurse, and let her take his blood pressure without even a peep. He just sat there and looked at the pressure cuff and chilled. Here he is in his ADORABLE baby hospital gown.

Our doctor was ~1 million years old, and almost completely deaf. Examine this excerpt of our conversation:

Doctor: Tell me about his reactions.

Me: Well, when I gave him a Gerber Graduate Garden Tomato crunchie, he got hives everywhere the crunchie dust touched. It's dusted, like a Cheeto.

Doctor: What kind of food was that?

Me: a Gerber Graduates tomato crunchie.

Doctor: What?

Me: A crunchie. It's like a Cheeto.

Doctor: What?

Me: Cheetos.

Doctor: What?

Me: A kind of snack food.

Doctor: What?

Me: SNACK FOOD.

Doctor: Seafood? [with a look like, "WHY would you give your baby SEAFOOD?]

Me: No, SUH NAH KUH FOOD!

Doctor: Oh, snack food?

Needless to say, it was a super fun appointment. I told him about the foods Nathaniel had reacted to, and then about some other random rashes I've found on him--including a raised rash he STILL has from a band-aid his doctor put on him after a shot on April 16th. Yes, he has had a rash for over 2 weeks from a baby band-aid. I'm not sure the doctor was listening/could hear me/noticed. But I did mention it.

In the end, he had a skin test for all sorts of things, like oranges and dust and pork and so forth. He got a giant hive for milk, and a giant hive for peanuts, and a smaller hive for eggs.

The doctor said to keep breastfeeding as long as possible, and to cut out those things from my diet. Sadday. I did have pasta carbonara for breakfast this morning, but I guess maybe I'll have to start cutting down on my dairy and egg intake. I already gave up peanuts, and I have always loathed milk and yogurt, but I have eggs with cheese for breakfast every morning. So I guess I need to find a new breakfast food.