Gluten intolerance in my 8 month old???

[Arbre de la vie]

When my son was almost 6 months old i gave him an arrowroot biscuit as he was eyeing mine off and figured 'it couldnt hurt'. well he loved it, but gave him the smelliest, foul diarrhea with even a tiny touch of blood.. so of course i freaked and he hasnt had anything like that since. well hes now 8 months and today i decided to give him some toast with a little smear of vegemite on it and the same thing happened. As soon as he's past it hes fine but obviously its not a normal reaction. i know it wasnt the vegemite because hes had it before so it must have been the bread.

sound like a gluten or wheat allergy/intolerance to you? how do you tell the difference? I'm not sure i will bother taking him to the doctor over it as i know theres nothing they will say except dont give him any for awhile and see. they wont test for gluten intolerances before about 3-4 years old because its too unreliable.

has anyone experienced this type of reaction with their bub and if so, is he likely to outgrow it?

neither DH or myself suffer from allergies or intolerances so this is all new territory for me. :(

[Lock and Lu]

I'm gluten intolerant and that sounds like the kind of reaction I have (sorry TMI). However, vegemite also contains gluten (it has barley) so maybe it's a wheat intolerance.

As with any suspected allergy or intolerance, you probably need to do a bit of trial and error-obviously without causing him a constantly upset tummy. Maybe every few days give him something new that contains gluten/wheat and see if he has the reaction every time.

Out of interest, does he have teething rusks? I'm pretty sure they have gluten.

I hope for your sake it's just a phase or his tummy's just getting used to something new. Good luck!

[Arbre de la vie]

Lock & Lu, i hadnt even though about vegemite having gluten in it! as i said he has had vegemite before, but only a light smear on the Rafferty's Garden banana milk teething rusks as wont take them coz they dont have any taste! but even so he only ever licked the vegemite off and threw the rusk away. so i cant use the rusks to test out any allergy :(. I give him the Baby Mum-Mum rice rusks all the time but they dont contain gluten or wheat.

I read that oats contain the mildest form of gluten so perhaps i can try him out on oats and see if he has the same reaction. at least if he does react to oats, it would separate the wheat out of the equasion.. wouldnt it? lol, i feel like i dont know what any food source contains anymore :P

[Emmi]

DD and I are severely gluten intolerant (we suspect coliac) and we can both tolerate oats. DD is far more sensitive then me, we have to give her nurofen if she ingests gluten as her whole body goes mental!
But then there are some Coliacs that can't have oats. Everyone is different :)