Green Poop

Don't worry, I don't have a picture to go with this post. Although I am given numerous opportunities to get one if you need a visual. A little over a week and a half ago Copper's poop turned green. I thought that maybe it was from the chili that I ate the night before, but it never went back to the weird, but normal, yellow. Pretty soon along with the change in color, also came some variations in texture and frequency. We're talking 8-10 poopy diapers a day! I got online and googled "green baby poop" and found many sites that talked about and showed pictures of baby poop. One cause of green poop can be not enough "hind" milk, but I dismissed that prognosis since I always feed her on one side only each feeding. The other cause is dairy in my diet. I wasn't thrilled to be reading that especially after my sister-in-law, Rian, brought up eliminating dairy while we were in Texas. Copper is a bit of a fussy baby and Rian had asked if she is always fussy and the answer to that is "yes." I wouldn't say that she's colicky since it's pretty easy to make her happy again and it's usually not a super serious cry, but she is pretty high maintenance. Dairy allergies are a pretty common cause of a fussy baby. Copper had a doctor's appointment last Friday and she seemingly on cue provided a stool sample. I had never seen blood in her poo, but the doctor ran a test on it and there is blood in her poo. The doctor then asked if she was a fussy baby (we were having this conversation over Copper's crying). When you combine fussy with green bloody pooh, you most likely have a baby with food allergies. Lucy had/has an allergy to the proteins in milk and it's possible that Copper does too. The doctor suggested that I elliminate dairy, nuts, fish, and soy from my diet for about 5 days to see if there is a change in Copper's mood and poo. There is a certain protein that is in all of these foods that baby's can be allergic to. If you weren't aware, I LOVE dairy. Milk, yogurt, ice cream, cheese...these are some of my favorite foods! I was bummed that I wouldn't be able to drink milk with pizza (my favorite combo) when I realized that it wouldn't matter since I wouldn't be able to eat pizza to begin with. Heavy sigh. It's been 2 days now without all of those wonderful foods and so far there hasn't been much of a change. I'm now aware that Copper's crazy little fits are most likely stomach aches since they are generally followed by an explosion in her pants. She may be a little less fussy, but it's hard to tell. While I'm not thrilled about eliminating so many wonderful foods from my diet, I do hope that this takes care of her discomfort and constant poops. If it is going to be a long term adjustment, we'll look in to alternative ways to eliminate the allergies. I plan on breastfeeding until she's at least one and that's about 10 months away. Asking me to not eat dairy is like asking me to forgo dessert after dinner. It will be a long, hard journey. But hopefully the rewards will far outweigh the sacrifice. Anything to make my little girl happy.