Food Allergy Awareness

Ryan and I both have food allergies. Ryan is lactose-intolerant. Both of us have adverse reactions to certain high-fat content foods. My throat feels like it closes up and a sore throat occurs. In addition to the self-diagnosed allergies, I also have random skin sensitivity and rashes. Emilia and Liam also both have skin sensitivities. So given our background, I would think I should be more aware.

We recently started Liam on solids and went with the conventional rice cereal. Ryan fed Liam a few bites, and for the next hour, Liam kept burping and spitting up. Didn't think much of it since it was one of his first solids. We continued with solids here and there over the next month, trying some banana and avocado and sweet potato. Liam finally got the hang of opening his mouth, moving his tongue, and swallowing food. Yea! So one night, the sweet potato was too watery, and without really thinking about it, I mixed in some baby rice cereal. Liam was doing awesome and eating all of it. He had eaten sweet potato earlier and had no reaction, so I thought all was good. We put him to bed and he fell sound asleep quickly. A little after midnight, there were gurgling noises coming from his crib and I knew something was wrong. His body was heaving and he started vomiting. Needless to say, the next 1-2 hours were spent with Ryan and I cleaning his crib, giving him a bath, and checking up on him. He continued to have burpings and threw up (just a little) again.

While this is not conclusive for a rice cereal allergy (not common but does exist) and it may be his young system in development, it reminds me that there are food allergies and families that deal with severe food allergies on a daily basis. In fact, people may have minor food allergies and not even be aware of it. My knowledge and awareness has increased especially with going on the Paleo diet/lifestyle, which in short, is dairy-free, gluten-free/grain-free, and legume-free. I have become much more aware of how difficult (and also how easy with the right tools) it is to live with food restrictions in a non-allergic friendly and highly-processed-food society. Luckily for me, the food restrictions are by choice without any adverse effects. Imagine if it isn't!

I have been following a blog, getallergywise.blogspot.com, co-authored by some moms I went to high school with, that document life with severely allergic kids. It definitely sheds light on how different of a life one would have, as a parent, to add something that seems so benign as "eating food" to the list of things that could harm your kid and how one simple lapse is dangerous.

I had taken Emilia to a birthday party recently and with her toddler-ways and a baby boy to tend to, I did not 100% keep track of Emilia. Next thing you know, she's eaten half of a chocolate chip cookie that someone gave her. It happened twice, and while I was not happy that her first tastes of chocolate came from a stranger and she had an overdose of sugar high, Emilia does not have any known food allergies and therefore it was not a freakout moment. I really hope that Liam does not have food allergies. We have yet to see. This does remind me to be diligently cautious when introducing foods to him, and also how fortunate the rest of us without major food allergies are!

A note to end on, while I am not 100% Paleo anymore (that'll be a different post), I take away a lot of positive changes from it and stick with being mostly dairy-free and gluten-free (not grain free though). I do think there may be sensitivities to dairy and gluten, as since being off of them, I have found that my skin rashes occur much less. Could it be from the change in diet and eliminating certain foods?..maybe.. maybe not? Whatever it is, the current lifestyle is working and sure beats going to the docs and taking medication. Last note, please do not feed any kids without first checking with the parents!