All babies are born with leaky guts and many progressive nutritionists and doctors recommend not starting solids too early because we have grown in our knowledge as to what causes leaky gut and what to do about it. One of those things is not to eat food you may be sensitive to.

I’ll give you a brief lesson in the difference between allergies and sensitivities. This makes a huge difference in how you talk to your doctor. I kept using the word allergy with our pediatrician and she kept disagreeing with me saying if Jess had a true allergy she may have blood in her stool, be vomiting a few other severe reactions and Jess did not have those kinds of reactions.

I believe now that Jess had sensitivities to wheat, dairy, beef, and was clearly reacting badly whenever I ate anything with too much sugar, natural or otherwise. Dr. Hoang did a muscle test to see if she was sensitive to wheat and dairy and she tested positive. I very much believe in and for the most part fully trust muscle testing to figure out difficult to figure out things in the body. A few times the results were a bit confusing so I never rely completely on a muscle test to figure out what is wrong in my body or my baby’s.

Here is what I learned about allergies vs. sensitivities:

IgE allergy is the type of allergy that someone who is allergic to peanuts might experience. Their throat tightens and they could go into anaphylactic shock. I was told by an allergy doctor that I should carry an epipen around just in case I had a reaction like that. She had done a skin prick test which showed different allergies than the blood test. Conventional allergy doctors typically do a skin reaction test called a skin prick test to determine allergies. Interestingly my skin prick test showed slightly different allergies than my blood test. IgE allergies are considered ‘true’ allergies.

Carolee Bateson-Koch DC, ND in her book Allergies: Disease in Disguise : How to Heal Your Allergic Condition Permanently and Naturally talks about food sensitives and says, “Food sensitivities is a common catchall term employed for food allergy, food intolerance and other adverse reactions to food. Proof of food allergy is still often difficult to establish. Most laboratory blood tests deal primarily in identifying the IgE antibody and often do not screen for reactions that may produce the IgG, IgA or IgM antibodies. It is interesting to note that the most accepted diagnostic test for allergy, the elimination diet and subsequent reintroduction of suspected substances, does not differentiate between the two terms, allergy and intolerance.”

Naturopathic doctor Russell B. Marz in his book Medical Nutrition from Marz said about the introduction of solid foods, “At the turn of the century 99% of all moms, in the U.S. were breast feeding. By the 1950’s and 60’s this percentage dropped to about 20% of moms. This is certainly unfortunate since this change has led to an increase in morbidity and mortality in infancy especially concerning the development of food allergies.” Pg. 298

He goes on to say, “If there is a strong family history of food allergies or sensitives it makes more sense to wait as long as possible before starting solid foods.” Pg. 298. There is a chart on page 299 showing a 6-8-month-old can have Swiss chard, mustard greens, spinach, collard greens green beans, banana, mung bean sprout because these foods have a high iron level. A 9-12-month-old can have lima beans, pinto beans peaches, grapes, pears, carrots, squash, cabbage as those foods are highest in iron. The foods higher in zinc would be kidney beans white potato, quinoa leeks. A 12-15 month can have quinoa, lentils, broccoli, chicken because these foods contain higher amounts of protein. A 15-18-month-old could have oatmeal, barley, larger amounts of fish, red meats and the foods to go very slowly with for a 18-24-month-old are eggs, wheat, yogurt, cashew butter, walnuts because these foods are the most difficult to digest. The lists on this page are much longer but I wanted to include a few things here to get you thinking, curious, and researching the best time, foods, and ways to introduce foods to your baby.