Hi everyone - As well as listowner, I am also a fellow milk avoider, so I am also very happy that this list has finally arrived! I am sure we can all learn so much from each other. Don't forget that everything that is posted goes into the archives, so we are already building up a valuable database of information that can be accessed around the world. That's why I am so excited about this project - in the end we will have the greatest resource on milk avoidance issues anywhere in the world! I only stopped using milk 6 months ago, which means that for 36 years it was damaging my health. I also cut out gluten from my diet at that time, and the difference to my life has been enormous. I had been suffering from continual mental and physical fatigue, stress, depression for many years, as well as other signs of mental and physical weakness, but I guess never obvious enough to warrant concern from doctors. . . As a child, I suffered a lot from ear infections and gastro-intestinal troubles, but nobody pointed out that a food problem might of been the cause. Well, it took me so long, but I survived! What I am already learning from this list is to see the patterns of milk-related symptoms, how milk intolerance becomes milk allergy and then starts throwing up other food intolerances and allergies, how the symptoms can go underground for years, emerging as developmental problems in the teens, and as chronic illnesses in adulthood. I am looking (as always!) for dietary advice, ways to strengthen and rebuild my body. My diet is severely limited by continuing intolerances to all sorts of foods, so people's experiences of which foods are hypo-allergenic are very useful to me. As someone else mentioned, turkey is a good non-allergic protein source. I also eat lamb, rabbit, salmon, pollack. For grains I have only found I can tolerate rice and quinoa, although I haven't tried some of the other new grains that are now in the shops. For vegetables, most sorts of cabbage, onion and root vegetables (NOT potatoes). For fruit only pears, and for oil only safflour! Nuts, seeds and legumes are a big problem, and I showed a BIG IgG sensitivity for eggs. I am avoiding all citrus and nightshade foods (tomatoes etc.) because of high phenol levels in those foods. I guess I ought to experiment more, but the trauma of some of the reactions is still fresh in my mind, so I'm not in too much of a hurry. So, that's me! Now I'll go back to being your hard-working listowner. Max