Sensitivity to fructose via breastmilk

[Belinda]

Me again!

Anyone else find that their kids were extremely sensitive to fructose via breastmilk?

At age 20 months, Angelina is taking 2 small breastfeeds per day and I'm still having to restrict both of our diets very much. Basically, no fruit (except lemons, limes or avocado), bare minimum sucrose, a few veges (pumpkin, celery, broccoli) and two slices of bread per day. The rest of our diet is free of wheat, onion, leeks and is full of dairy, chips, meat/fish, gluten-free pasta/crackers/biscuits and dextrose.

I plan on continuing breastfeeding til age 2 - I did the same for big brother Sebastian. It took so long to get things right with him, I felt like I was stopping just as I started! A breastfeed has also been the only way Angelina would settle when she woke in the night with stomach upset. Thank goodness I've now worked out a basic diet for both of them.

I'm really wondering if I should pursue a possible diagnosis of HFI for Angelina given her extreme fructose sensitivity? Are any of you with HFI also sensitive to wheat or is that more typical of DFI? I can predict you'll say check to be sure, but I worry a lot about the invasiveness of the procedures to diagnose HFI...

[Tammy]

Belinda,
I was always told that breastmilk is ok for HFI. The mother's liver deals with the fructose that the mother eats. She doesn't need to restrict her diet, either.

I have a tendency to believe Angelina doesn't have HFI if she is tolerating the things you listed. Like Fred said, there is too much fructose there for HFI. Regina can't handle ANY sucrose. Even 1 slice of regular bread would make her sick, and also pumpkin is out.
Tammy

[Chelsea]

Hi there. I am a former member of this group, I still stop by occasionally to check and see how friends are doing. My DD was shown finally not to have HFI during a liver biopsy this past November.

The reason I decided to post is because I am a lactation consultant. Breastmilk contains a minunscal amount of fructose as it's base composition. It would be far less than if one were to eat broccoli once a week. The composition in terms of breastmilk does not change with consumption by the mother. Fructose does not "pass through" the breastmilk.

Proteins do however, so if your dealing with a wheat allergy that is something that needs to be removed from your diet.

[Belinda]

Thanks so much for posting Tammy and Fred. Thanks for the info about breast milk Chelsea - I couldn't find information anywhere about levels of fructose in breastmilk, so what a great thing you have your expertise to offer!

I definitely know that Angelina is reacting to sugar, fruit and most veges both when fully breastfed and when she eats those things herself now at 20 months of age. Both of my kids wake with stomach upset and/or reflux and cough 10 to 12 hours after they eat sugar/fruit/certain veges. We just did another wheat challenge and it turns out that it was the sweet biscuits she wasn't tolerating. Bread, crackers and pasta seem to be tolerated fine. As are potatoes, rice, dairy, meats and dextrose.

I don't think salicylates or amines are the problem as she is extremely reactive to pears which are said to be salicylate-free. I can't think of any other explanation...

[momto3]

Hi, My DD is 5 now, was Dx FI as a baby after she was introduced to food. I breastfed her. At 11 weeks she had a kidney infection and was in the hospital for a few days. She was only breastfed at 11 wks. Her urine show reducing substances at that time, fructose. The doctors didn't think anything of it at that time. DD never had much of an appetite and I needed to feed her because I could feel my breast were full. My boys I could feed on demand, but not DD. Only after she started failing to thrive and months of tests did they figure out fructose was a problem. We cut way back on fructose from her diet and she started putting weight on. She even made it to 3% on the weight charts, 50% on height. Now that she is 5 years old her doctor likes her low BMI, but as a baby is scared all of us. We don't know if DD is DFI or HFI. But I did want to let you know that we saw fructose in DD when only breastfed.

[Marylene1]

Hereby I want to share my experiences with breastmilk with you. Although my daughter is not fully diagnosed, she is suspected of HFI (you can read about it in: fasting & bloodsucker.... blood sugar, a stupid mistake). The first problems we encountered were directly after birth. My daughter was to weak to breastfeed her. I used a breast pump and gave the milk to her by bottle. She refused drinking it many times. We now know my daughter is extremely sensitive to fructose. She showed stomach ache and reflux from the very beginning. Now we think its due to fructose in the breastmilk. 80% of the carbohydrates are lactose, but breastmilk also contains oligo-saccharin (source: voedingscentrum).

[sarahk]

Hey Marylene,

I actually looked into this subject quite a bit before Ethan was born 11 months ago.

It is highly unlikely that breatmilk is the cause of your daughters problems. Ethan also had a very hard time nursing in the beggining, and would spit-up quite a bit-he eventually "latched" but the spit-up continued. We tried everything-even those angled pillows...

We were also using a soy/milk formula at the same time-which I checked was sugar free--once we switched to an all soy formula his reflux and spit-ups pretty much stopped. We don't believe it is a milk problem b/c he eats yogurt and baby mac n' cheese, but it is likely that the milk formula was too hard on his system.

Was your daughter supplemented with formula-or was she on breastmilk only?

I can't speak for all the HFIers, but Sarah was breastfed and was fine. She pushed most food and drinks away too as a child, and her parents and to really hold her down to force medicines-which we all know are loaded with sugar-into her-especially the pink amoxasilan given to children.

So, if your daughter had an aversion to breastmilk, it was likely do to some other subtances in the milk, proteins perhaps, but highly unlikely that it was from the sugar.

[colormist]

I didn't have any issues with breastmilk as a child. I was wonder if, perhaps, Marylene's daughter might be lactose intolerant as well? I think we've had at least one other case here that was HFI and lactose intolerant

[lionessmom]

Feb 21, 2007 12:23:37 GMT -5 Chelsea said:

Hi there. I am a former member of this group, I still stop by occasionally to check and see how friends are doing. My DD was shown finally not to have HFI during a liver biopsy this past November.

The reason I decided to post is because I am a lactation consultant. Breastmilk contains a minunscal amount of fructose as it's base composition. It would be far less than if one were to eat broccoli once a week. The composition in terms of breastmilk does not change with consumption by the mother. Fructose does not "pass through" the breastmilk.

Proteins do however, so if your dealing with a wheat allergy that is something that needs to be removed from your diet.

if youever come back i would like to ask you a question. my odlest daughter threw up alot as an infant. but it didnt start until she was 6 weeks old. my milk has high lipase in it. i can tell bc if i thaw it out it smells like soap and they wont drink it. my younger child didnt throw up but still has DFI symptoms. the only difference between them is that i drank an extreme amount of chocolate milk with the older and none with the younger. wither during pregnancy or while breastfeeding. the older one has more severe symptoms. is it possible my preg diet made her more sensitive? could high lipase be a problem?

[hfimomof3]

It is possible that the child is sensitive to some other component of the mom's diet besides fructose. For example, the child might be allergic to wheat or onions etc. It could be that a child is BOTH fructose-intolerant, AND allergic to certain of the mom's dietary components.