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The fear of introducing new foods is real and strong. This mama bear doesn’t want anything to happen to her baby, especially not by her own doing. The idea of causing your baby pain by giving them new food is nauseating. Causing our baby’s possible pain goes against everything in us as parents.
How do we solve this? You don’t want to limit your baby’s diet because of fear right? You don’t want your baby growing up living solely off hotdogs and strawberries.
When our little girl H was about seven/eight months old we started picking up on her allergies. We went to the doctor and allergist and started doing testing. In the meantime, though we wanted to continue introducing new foods. After a few mild reactions fear started kicking in. We had this fear of causing her pain or discomfort.
It was so easy to just give her applesauce. Doesn’t that sound terrible? It bothered me that I was taking the easy way out. I learned though and realized I have to keep going. I have to keep giving her new foods. I want her to eat a healthy variety of foods and learn different tastes and textures.
We started taking steps that I want to share with you to overcome our fear of introducing new foods to our allergy baby.
Find the Patterns
The first step in avoiding your baby’s allergens is to know what they are and avoid them. Testing is a huge tool in this, but you may not test for everything on the planet.
So let’s focus on what you can do at home.
You need to journal EVERYTHING!
Journal what they ate and drank during a meal. If you are a breastfeeding momma start tracking everything you eat and drink too.
Look over your baby’s body for breakouts. For our little H, it primarily happened on her face and hands. Other times it would show up on her neck and stomach
This is the most tedious thing to do. I never enjoyed this phase.
The thing I found easiest was to plan out H’s meals and write them in the journal for the week. If we ended up not serving her a specific food I just marked it out. After the meal, we noted any responses she had to the food.
Just journal and makes notes on everything. Trust me. You will forget.
Look for what is trend is happening. Journal everything.
Educate Yourself
Get as much information from your pediatrician or allergist as possible. Go to every appointment with a list of questions. And don’t be afraid to ask them. Soak up as much knowledge as you can for the experts.
Start reading ingredient labels. Break them down and start understanding what is actually in your food. There is a learning curve, but you will get there.
This sounds tough, but it’s your responsibility to get a handle on all this.
Follow Your Gut
If something feels unsafe consult your doctor and directly ask what they think. Find the safest way to introduce something new.
Allergists often offer the option to do food tests in the office. This is awesome if you have a fear of doing something at home. We seriously considered doing an in-office food test for peanut butter. Instead, we came up with our safety plan for doing so at home and made the decision that was best for us at the time and in our situation.
Introduce Food Safely
Know your safety plan.
Only introduce new food while at home and with your partner whenever possible. This was a rule we established for risky foods in particular. We also live five minutes away from a hospital, which goes a long way.
Have medicine such as an EpiPen available at home.
Know what you would do in an emergency. Go over this with your partner.
Also, know any important medical information if you go to the hospital. Know your baby or child’s weight. Know what medications they are on if any and what you may have given them during their reaction.
Be proactive. Have a plan. Have your information ready.
When it comes to your baby there isn’t time to mess around.
Establish Safety Rules
Like I said before have a safety plan.
You may also need to establish rules related to your child. When you don’t completely know what they are allergic to a safe rule is that you as parents are the only people who can introduce them to something new.
For example, if your baby is with a caregiver or a grandparent you send packed food. They do not feed your child anything you have not provided.
This is a rule to keep your baby safe, but it is also a rule to protect the caregiver. How awful would they feel if they caused your little one to have a reaction?
It’s For Their Own Good
Don’t let the fear of trying new food keep your baby or child on a five-food diet. They need variety to hit their vitamins and nutrients.
Sometimes a mild reaction happens and that’s ok. You were not trying to bring your child pain or discomfort. You were trying to allow them to experience another food.
Despite how nervous you are to give them a new food to try just know it is for their own good.
Conclusion
This is a real fear. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
It’s scary to feel like the introduction of a new food could harm your child. As parents the moment your child is born you have a steady level of anxiety and worry. You have a baseline.
Once food allergies come into the picture that level rises. Is anyone giving my child food? How near to a hospital are we?
It is ok to be scared.
We combat this fear with education and always having a plan. You can do this. You will get through it.
Check Out My Articles
How to Figure Out if my Baby Has Allergies
Fear, Future, and Failure that Come with Your Child’s Food Allergies
How Food Journaling Can Help Determine if Your Baby has Allergies
Is there a Chance my Baby Could Outgrow Their Food Allergies One Day?
