Milk of kindness

BLOTCHY red, itchy skin had been the bane of Amanda Cooper's life for as long as she could remember. Diagnosed with eczema as a child, she had tried special creams and diets to keep her unpleasant skin condition under control, but to no avail.

"It started off behind my knee and graduated to my toes. It was itchy all the time and at school I was always fidgeting. It was really hard to concentrate and affected my school work," says Amanda, now aged 35, of Haxby.

Getting changed for PE or swimming was embarrassing too, she says, and made her self conscious. "I had red patches on the inside of my arms... I'm sure some people thought I was taking drugs."

By her late teens, she even had outbreaks of eczema on her face.

Just before her wedding to Christopher in 1989, her GP sent her to see a specialist at York District Hospital, who suggested that stress could be the cause.

"There was nothing I was worried about," says Amanda. "Then I was concerned that I was worried about something but didn't realise I was worried about it!"

It was during the couple's honeymoon on the Mediterranean island of Majorca that Amanda gained an insight into what might be causing her eczema.

"We were away for ten days and not once did I have any itchiness or redness. On the plane back, Chris and I talked about what might be causing the eczema. Could it be stress? After all, the holiday had been really relaxing. But I'm not a worrier and I just didn't believe this was the cause," said Amanda.

She had suspected that dairy produce might be a trigger, but ruled this out too as she had been drinking milk while in Majorca.

It was at this point that Christopher pointed out she'd been drinking goat's milk rather than cow's milk as there were no cows in Majorca. Could this be the answer?

"It seemed to all fall into place," said Amanda. On her return home, she began looking for goat's milk, which wasn't readily available in supermarkets at the time. "I was working as a sales rep and one day while out driving I came across a farm selling goat's milk."

Amanda became one of its best customers and began buying in bulk - "it freezes for up to a month", she adds - which kept her eczema at bay.

When Amanda told her GP about her discovery, she was sent to a dietician at York District Hospital who confirmed she had an intolerance to casein - milk protein - which is in cow's milk and goods such as milk chocolate, cheese, yoghurt, many tinned meals and frozen meals and even bread.

When Amanda became pregnant with her first child, she had to give up the farm's goat milk as it was unpasteurised, but discovered a pasteurised alternative from St Helen's Farm at Seaton Ross in the East Riding. The farm also sold cream, yoghurt and butter made from goat's milk, which all made Amanda's life easier.

Just as she was getting to grips with her eczema, she discovered her son Joshua shared the same allergy. The first time she gave him a glass of cow's milk he broke out in a nasty, itchy, red rash. She was advised not to give him goat's milk until he was two years old, and instead fed him with follow-on formula milk and dairy-free baby food.

She repeated the same pattern with her second child Emily, who also has eczema. She plans to do likewise with her new baby Tanya.

Joshua is eight years old next month and can now tolerate a little bit of dairy produce, which he regulates himself. Like Amanda, he can have one cow's milk product a day such as some pizza, a bit of milk chocolate or a Yorkshire pudding - but anything more will inflame the condition.

Amanda says Emily is too young to cope with dairy food and is learning what produce to avoid. "If she's given something at a party she asks me if it will make her itchy, so she is starting to understand," said Amanda.

Shopping for the family can take time as Amanda has to check the labels for anything which might trigger eczema. And the food bill is more expensive as goat's-milk goods can cost up to twice as much as those made from cow's milk.

One recent discovery which Amanda has welcomed is that her children can eat fromage frais. "We are allergic to casein, the milk protein, and when you separate the curd from the whey, most of the protein stays with the curd, so we can have products made from the whey such as fromage frais."

Amanda recently got a bread maker, so she can make her own loaves and pizza bases using goat's milk - topping her pizza with sheep's cheese, which she prefers for its lighter taste.

She makes sure her children receive their required doses of calcium by giving them glasses of goat's milk, cereal with goat's milk and milkshakes and hot chocolate made with goat's milk every day.

Although the children can't eat milk chocolate, they can have plain chocolate - and Amanda buys them plain chocolate Easter eggs.

She has to be particularly careful when the family eat in restaurants and has to ask the staff to check with the chef that no cow's milk products are in their food.

Despite all of this, she slips up occasionally.

"I still get caught out. One night I woke up with really intense itching. I thought about what I'd eaten and realised it must have been some frankfurters I'd had," said Amanda.

She knows there are worse problems she and her children could face, such as diabetes or nut allergies. She added: "When you know what is the cause, you can find ways to work around it."

But, she confesses, the cravings for forbidden foods never go away.

"Emily loves sausage rolls and would have more of them if she could. I miss cheese on toast: really big slices of cheese melting on to the toast. But I've got to be careful as sheep's milk cheese is three or four times the price... I can just imagine the supermarket bill!"

For more advice about living with eczema and allergies, contact the National Eczema Society on 020 7281 3553, helpline 0870 241 3604 (1pm-4pm Monday-Friday) online at www.eczema.org or York Allergy Support on 01904 782547 or www.communigate.co.uk/york/allergysupport or York Eczema Support Group 01757 248098.

The healthy alternative:

RISING numbers of people are turning to goat's milk as a healthy alternative to cow's milk.

Three in four people said goat's milk had improved their health, in a survey undertaken for goat's milk producer St Helen's Farm, of Seaton Ross.

In the biggest survey of its kind, more than two thirds of the 2,000 people questioned said they had switched to goat's milk for health reasons, with almost half of them advised to do so by health professionals.

Anthony Frew, Professor of Allergy and Respiratory Medicine at the University of Southampton, said most people who were intolerant to cow's milk could usually digest goat's milk more easily. He said the nutritional profile of goat's milk was greatly superior to soya and other cow's milk alternatives.

The survey confirmed goat's milk could help to reduce or in some cases eliminate common conditions such as asthma, eczema, catarrh and some digestive disorders.

Updated: 09:13 Tuesday, January 29, 2002