Living with allergies, a personal perspective

In light of the recent debate on banning peanuts from schools, I thought sharing our story would give some personal perspective to the discussion.

When I enrolled my daughter at a local YMCA last year, I was relieved to find out that they didn’t serve peanut products, and that they discouraged parents to bring peanut butter sandwiches to the premises. It was one less thing to think about with managing my daughter’s multiple allergies, and I appreciated the school for it. 

Outside of school, my family still has to be extremely careful about what and where we eat, what and who we let our children play with and touch. They (daughter and son are now diagnosed with allergies) react upon contact to allergens, so our friends and their children know to wash their hands before touching my kids. There are play areas my daughter can’t go to, like inside the fastfood play areas, because I am almost certain those won’t be allergy-free. I wipe down the table and chairs in places I don’t know are safe surfaces. We don’t even go to Italian restaurants anymore because cheese would be everywhere. We’re cautious about buffets and Chinese take-outs because of the chance of cross-contaminants. I am fortunate to have a family friend whose gradeschooler son has the same allergies as my daughter, and he is happy to share his knowledge of safe restaurants and food. But for each new restaurant we want to try, I have to call ahead and find out if there are food we can eat. Once there, I talk to the manager and inform them again of our case. Most are really happy to accommodate our requests. And we always go back to allergy-friendly restaurants so our favorite servers know us already.

But I have come across people who look at me like I am crazy or something. Are they thinking I’m a germophobic? Over-protective? Exaggerating?

One of our casual friends thought something along that line, until one night they were eating dried peanuts (with shells) and my daughter had a severe reaction when she entered the room. After that incident, our friend took the initiative to learn more about my child’s allergies and now he reads labels like I do.

Airlines are worse. We know now to call ahead and ask an airline’s policy about peanuts. One airline told us they don’t serve peanuts BUT they can’t prevent their passengers from bringing, and eating peanuts inside the cabin. That’s not gonna help. On one flight, we ordered allergy-free food for me and my daughter, and Indian food was the only safe meal. Unfortunately, my daughter has never taken to Indian food. These days, I am grateful airlines don’t serve meals anymore since I can prepare something ahead that I know will be safe.

Aside from the medical implications, there is a stigma that my child feels, that she’s not like other kids. So I decided to put myself off the same food that she’s allergic to, especially when she’s around. And when I was pregnant, that decision paid off. My infant son has no allergies the food that I abstained from, and his allergic reactions to other food are not as severe as his sister.

We try our best to make like as normal as possible. We certainly don’t want our children to think of themselves with stigmas. Allergies are a challenge, life-threatening at times, but certainly not something that can’t be overcome (hopefully) or managed well. And if, God forbid, our children don’t get over their allergies for life, then it’s one of the things that we all would have to deal with, and make us better persons because of it.  It has certainly given us more compassion to other families suffering with disease or other challenges. I think I feel like, ‘we’re all in this together, so let me help make life a little easier for you.’