A Focus On Food Allergies
When I was a kid you never really heard about life threatening food allergies. It would never have even crossed my mind that taking a PB&J for lunch could harm someone. Things change though. Now there are very few classrooms that don’t have at least one food allergy. Although not all of those allergies are so bad that they warrant an Epi-pen. I used to be nervous when I subbed in a classroom that had a student that had an Epi-pen. I never wanted to have to use it, and I always relaxed at the end of the day when I didn’t need to worry any more. Now I have to worry about needing to use one all of the time.
Dealing with a life threatening food allergy has become a way of life in our house. I read all of the ingredients on food labels (not all of them mention allergy ingredients in bold type). I work on finding ways to let Nick eat as many different types of food as I can. I don’t ever want him to feel he has to miss out on things because of his allergy.
What many parents probably don’t realize though is that even if your child doesn’t have a severe food allergy that doesn’t mean that they won’t ever have to worry about them. Enough children today have such an allergy that there is a good chance that many families will host a child with an allergy whether it’s for a meal, a sleepover, or even a birthday party. It’s nice not having to worry about what your child eats, but it can put you at a disadvantage when you have to worry about the food that someone else’s kid can and can’t eat.
I honestly don’t worry that Nick will have an allergy issue when he’s with us since we all know what he can and can’t eat. At this age his allergy is fairly easy to handle since he’s normally with us, so it’s easy to monitor his food. I do worry though about what will happen when he gets older and we’re not with him. We’ll teach him what he needs to know about his allergy, but accidents happen.
Since Nick’s egg allergy has become such a big things in our lives I have decided to start writing some blog posts that focus on food allergies. There will be informational posts as well as recipes that are adjusted for those with food allergies. If there are any questions that you have about food allergies, or information that you’d like, please let me know so I can focus posts on them.
