I never listened to any of the talk about milk and dairy until our youngest was about 4 months old and struggling with severe reflux and mucus. The pediatrician suggested I remove all dairy from my diet. When I did, I found my health and weight improved dramatically. My allergies cleared up and I lost all of my baby weight pretty quickly. Unfortunately, it didn’t help the baby at all and after allergy tests a few months later we learned he wasn’t allergic. Although I felt better off dairy, I didn’t stick to it much longer.
Then about a year and a half ago, when I first started to see Dr. Jana Joshu and we started to change our diets I found that dairy was essentially removed from the menu once again. As a result of the diet changes, our allergies improved, I lost a few extra pounds I was carrying around, my anxiety improved and the boys’ eczema cleared up. Of course, we were making lots of healthy changes so I can’t contribute all of them to dairy, but this second time around was enough for me to limit our dairy intake and make more careful choices about the dairy we do consume.
Over the last few months I’ve learned more and more about dairy, its history and how it has changed over the years. I’ve read that many of the reasons milk and dairy have gotten a bad reputation can be attributed to what’s not in our milk rather than what is. According to some experts, the diet and health of the cows combined with the pasteurization process have changed what was once a nutritious part of our diet. The missing vitamins, enzymes and other elements combined with the hormones and chemicals that can find their way into our milk are the reason many of us now avoid dairy.
Check out my guest post at Faithful Provisions for more on milk and milk alternatives. I don’t have a definitive answer on this one, but for now, we are continuing to limit our dairy intake.
