Primal Baby/Grains page

[musogirl]

Hi all, I'm looking for some advice about feeding my seven month old baby.

My husband and I are more or less Primal (about four months now) - we don't eat any grains at all, and we eat lots of meat and veg, along with a little starch in the form of potatoes. (I'm still working on giving up sugar, except for fruit... let's just say it's a work in progress.)

We have a seven month old, and we started Baby Led Weaning nearly four weeks ago. (For anyone who is unfamiliar with BLW, it's basically give the baby what you eat in finger-size pieces and let them feed themselves. Google it, it's fantastic. I'm still breastfeeding though.)

Anyway, since we've cut out all gains I've certainly felt much better for it, but now when I've had some grain (floured potato wedges a couple of weeks ago) my stomach has not responded well - bloating and gas pains. I'm not worried for myself, but I'm slightly concerned about the effect it might have on the baby's digestive system if we keep her totally grain-free. At some point when we won't have total control over what she eats, whether at school or at someone else's house, she will eat grain in some form. If a couple of months off the grain is bad news for me, might it set up some unpleasant intolerance if she has never eaten it before? We give her sugar in the form of fruit and veg such as carrots, so not worried about making her extremely insulin sensitive.
But while I'm very pro-Primal for health, I'm concerned about setting her up with an intolerance to gluten/grains which will make life harder in the future.

Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

Thanks!

[loafingcactus]

I know there is some research that suggests keeping gluten away until 2 years makes the child less likely to develop Celiac Disease, but I couldn't locate that right off. I did see this:
The Importance of Exclusive Breastfeeding in Infants at Risk for Celiac Disease

[Bishop]

Plenty of people here do not have a horrible reaction to bits of grains here and there. Especially non wheat grain. A young child may not be much different.

I don't have much to offer. My 15 month old was having wheat and oat reactions before we cut out grains, so I know he was sensitive regardless of primal.
There are always going to be situations where your child might get sick from food when away from home. Even if you fed a healthy diet with a few grains here and there, your kid would still be likely to have a reaction to a sudden mass quantity of corn syrup, sugar, and additives. Any diet that is relatively healthy is going to cause this issue in social situations when crap food is encouraged. Eventually your child will understand what makes her not feel good and can choose to avoid those.

[musogirl]

Thank you for this! There's no celiac in the family, so she's not in a high-risk group, but I've found a couple of things that suggest it's not a bad thing to stay away from grains until at least the age of one, when their digestive system is better developed. Guess we'll be playing it by ear!

[jkr]

Keeping grains out of her regular diet will only make her gut health stronger. She'll probably be able to handle them better than you during occasional consumption.

[musogirl]

Thanks JKR! Just out of curiosity, how does that work? I was thinking that keeping something out of her diet would mean her system would be totally unaccustomed to it when it was introduced so she might get a bad reaction (not anaphalaxis bad but dodgy tummy!). Can you point me towards any information on this? The internet is such a useful resource but there's so much out there that it's hard to pin down the relevant stuff without a jumping off point!

[Nutritionator]

The Primal Parent, Everyday Paleo and The Healthy Skeptic should be all the resources you need!