When you discover a food allergy, do you go cold turkey?

Milk is one of the most common adult-onset allergies there is, so I'm not surprised to hear that you have started to have problems after many years of being OK with it. I wouldn't advise you to cut milk and other dairy products out of your diet entirely before speaking to your doctor because you might find that, if you do, you start to miss out on vital nutrients, particularly calcuim. Before making a decision, here are a couple of things to consider: 1) Do you get symptoms only after drinking milk? If you do, just cut out the milk and get your calcium from cheese, yoghurt etc. instead. 2) How severe are the symptoms of the allergy? In most cases, they are mild, so you won't suffer too much if you continue to consume milk. If they are more severe, obviously you'd be better off keeping away from milk and related products altogether. If you do choose to avoid milk, make sure that you get the vitamins and minerals it provides elsewhere.

why don't you try to check which dairy products affects you less? maybe it's just cow milk that you are allergic to (then you could try sheep or goat milk). When you're sure which dairies you can take, better. I have allergy too but can manage to process cheese and somekind of yoghurts...

I found out a couple of years ago that I was allergic to milk and I would say cut it out slowly. It's also really hard to realise all the products that milk are in. The major things I cut out first was milk, butter, cheese yoghurt, cream icecream and custard. That was for about a year then I slowly cut out more things that would contain them, such as instant mash potato, and chocolate. Now I eat nothing with milk in this even comes down to obscure things like processed meat and crisp flavourings. You do find that you ahve to check the packets on absolutely everything which is a huge pain but it does become easier. I would stock up on dairy alternative such as soya milk and butter. You can get dairy free ice cream cheese and even custard. You might want to look into taking calcium supplements as well ecause you suddenly lose a lot of calcium out of your diet. If you've got any more questions feel free to pm me.

I did. I went cold turkey on milk products after I was diagnosed that I had rheumatoid arthritis. I discovered, after a fast and a shift to a vegetarian diet, that I was allergic to milk. It triggers painful inflammation in my joints so I had to stay away from milk and other dairy products. I drink vitamin and mineral enriched soy milk instead and take calcium supplements too.