Soy Hungry?

This little munchkin turned 9 months old this week. I was hoping to be back to my pre-pregnancy weight by the time she turned 9 months (you know...9 months to put it on and 9 months to take it off) but let's face it...I gained 65 pounds with her and that is a WHOLE lot of weight! In my defense, I have lost 60 pounds (on a good day) or 55 (on a bad day...YES, I fluctuate THAT much) and these last 5-10 pounds are really giving me grief. The problem is this: I LOVE to eat. I mean, really, who doesn't love to eat? And with all of the running I am doing, you'd think that a little overindulgence here or there wouldn't derail my weight loss efforts the way it seems to. O.K. Maybe derail was a bit strong of a word. I am maintaining my weight loss up to this point but I can't seem to shed these last few pounds. People continue to tell me that maybe when I am done nursing Cali, my body will finally release the last of it. But, that is still a few months off. For now, I am going to celebrate how far I have come.

Speaking of food and how much fun it is to eat...Cali definitely would seem to agree. She enjoys just about everything that we put in front of her. She's got the adorable chub to prove it (just look at those cute pudgy hands as she reaches for more cantaloupe!) Unfortunately for Cali, we have discovered that she has a milk and egg allergy...which makes feeding her more of a chore than I want it to be. We discovered this allergy a few months ago when she had a severe allergic reaction to some formula that I had put into her rice cereal. She turned purple from head to toe, with big, white hives, and she was throwing up. After taking her to an allergist and having the skin and blood test, it was confirmed that she has a milk and egg allergy. I carry an epi pen around in my diaper bag now.

There are obvious things that she can't have such as yogurt, milk, cheese, eggs, etc. But, I am discovering that there are so many things that have milk and eggs in it (especially milk). Chocolate for example. Oh, yeah...MILK chocolate. And most cookies and cakes have some sort of egg or milk product. Even those little baby crackers and cookies have milk derivatives such as whey. It is becoming quite difficult to figure out what to give my baby who is so anxious to start eating everything. And protecting her from herself and other people is going to be a challenge. The other day I was with some other moms and their kids. Cali was rolling around on the ground and I looked down to find her with some other kid's sippy cup of MILK in her mouth! I quickly grabbed it away but she had already ingested some of it. Luckily she only had a small reaction to it. Eventually we are hoping to be able to experiment with introducing baked goods and other things into her diet but the allergist said we'll wait until she is about 18 months old and do it in his office. So for now I am going to start focusing on all of the things that she CAN have and remind myself that although this is a difficult inconvenience, I have friends with kids who are dealing with some pretty serious medical situations. It could be so much worse! So break out some soy chocolate and soy cheese...my baby is hungry!