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My mom let us play on the floor, and if we happened to swallow the odd dust bunny, did not freak out. I raised my kids the same way. They have remarkably healthy immune systems and are not afraid to get a little "dirty" at play or in life. As to where the allergies are coming from, lots of good theories and info here. I think it encompasses a little of all this. But it is high time we let our kids be kids again, too.
To the poster who mentioned his child has this allergy, what steps do you take to prevent contact? What measures does the school district take? Do you feel the school does not enough/just enough/too much to help with your child's allergy?
Hi there...
Our oldest son, now six and in 1st grade, has allergies to peanuts, tree nuts, milk and eggs. I agree with your previous post. As his parents, we knew from a very early age of his allergies, and we took it upon ourselves to educate us, his caregivers, and himself of his allergies and the cautions he need to take. It is up to us his parents and as he matures and gets older, himself, to take the precautions needed. We cannot and should not depend on others. He will live in a world where allergies exist and our son at six is extremely knowledgeable of his allergies and knows to ask when given food if it contains, milk, eggs or peanuts.
That is why I posted my long post, to talk about options out there and treatments and tests available. It is important to understand that until this year there hasnt been much good testing available for parents. You are either given a yes or no to allergies, and if yes you are told to avoid all allergen foods. Now we know through the ISAC (allergen component testing) that some kids are allergic to only certain proteins in the food and not others. This can in some cases, allow the allergic kid to eat foods with baked or cooked milk, or maybe the kid was testing for a peanut allergy and he/she through this testing is only allergic to the non-life threatening proteins in peanuts. Knowledge is power and unfortunately until very recently very little knowledge has been available, so there has been some over-reacting going on. Now our son was verified as to be allergic to the life threatening types of protein in peanuts and as well as milk and eggs. But we also know from our allergy doctor that he does not have the air borne peanut allergy, which very very few actually have thankfully. His hands have touched milk in pre-school and he did get blisters on that spot where milk touched and his tongue did well a little and he got rashes, which benadryl took care of.
Getting to your question...we take our son to movie theatres where butterd popcorn and nuts are sold and eaten. We got permission from the theatre owner to bring in our own non-butter popcorn popped at home, so he eats that. We wipe down the chair he sits in with a wipe and that is about all we do. Of course we carry an epi-pen and benadryl packages in a backpack at all times wherever he goes.
Our school system is great. 1st grade they do ask for snacks to be brought in for mid afternoon as 1st graders eat at 11 am. The school district and nurse made his room peanut free, and a letter was sent home to ask parents to avoid sending in peanut butter crackers, etc into the classroom for snacks. And after snack all kids do wash their hands. The school decided this, this was not a demand on us.
At lunch, there is one table that is peanut free where he sits and anyone who sits there cannot have brought in peanut butter, nuts, in for lunch. Milk is ok and eggs too. There is a teacher's aide who sits at the table to watch spills. All the other table are open to peanuts, etc. The school itself uses a peanut-free peanut butter (sun butter) in their school made PBJ sandwiches, but students can bring in actual Peanut butter in from home, just do not sit at my sons table. My son doesnt sit alone. there are many kids at his table.
We are pleased with the school district so far and have had no issues. Same with his pre-school and daycare.
One thing we are a bit iffy on doing yet is for him to visit another friends house that we dont know very well. We feel we shouldnt put that parent on the defensive and be afraid to have food around our son. We prefer to invite his friend to our house.
We have 2 1/2 yr twin boys as well...and they thankfully do not have any food allergies. But we only have soy milk in the house. Wish they made soy milk in gallon jugs though.
These kind of stories drive me nuts (no pun intended). I have a daughter who is severely allergic to milk, so I personally know the danger and the fear related to allergies. However, it seems like more and more schools and parents are making unreasonable requests, which makes all of us allergy parents look bad and have to fight harder for understanding. Not being able to bring in a snack for your own child in a ziploc bag is completely unreasonable. I would fight that even though I have a child with a food allergy! Pre-packaged snacks cost more and are often not as healthy for a child.
I have found many times that some parents dealing with peanut allergies can be a little more nervous because of all the media attention surrounding that particular allergy. I have talked to a number of parents who have asked for a bunch of accommodations, but during my line of questioning, I discover they asked for them out of fear more than actual case history. Most of the times, it turns out my daughter has a case history indicating a much more severe allergy than the parents I am talking to. Yet, since my daughter is allergic to milk and not peanuts, it is not possible to expect milk-free tables, rooms or schools. She has to get by without this.
For my daughter, she carries an Epipen in her bookbag, in addition to the Epipens in two other spots in the school. Aside from that, I just remind teachers not to give her food, and sometimes I have to ask kids to wash their hands. The only real accommodation I asked the school to make was to move a guinea pig from a classroom since she is really allergic to that animal. I felt bad asking for that. I can't imagine asking for all the other parents to change their world for my daughter.
I would try to rally some other more reasonable allergy parents to your side. The fact is a manufacturer's warning is usually only a potential problem for a child ingesting a product. My daughter does not eat products with such warnings, but she has never had a problem handling such a product. (which would not be the case if she was holding something like cheese). This issue would be similar for ziploc snacks. If a child brought peanuts in a bag, that would be obvious. Other products that are not as obvious would be unlikely to cause a problem unless the allergic child eats them. The concern about the rather unusual airborne reaction stems mainly from peanut dust, not food crumbs.
I agree.... that is why it is so important to get this newer testing done (ISAC).
Many parents who know their kid has peanut allergies tend to go overboard out of fear due to lack of good testing. Through this testing and others that are in research, hope is each child will know his/her own risk factors. Most peanut allergic kids will only suffer a reaction if he/she touches or ingests a peanut, a very very small minority can if breathing it. The amount needed to get a full blown reaction is very different from child to child. A new test coming out in the winter-spring can help us tell how much tolerance a person has in his system before a reaction occurs.
After my rant above, I thought I would get back on topic. Only one of my three kids has allergies, and I would love to know what caused them! There are some differences in their early lives. Here are the ones I remember:
-I was in a very stressful job working overnight shift when I was pregnant with my allergy child. I had a more relaxing life when I was pregnant with the other two.
-I only received pitocin for my allergy child, who was late.
-My allergy child received heavy doses of antibiotics when she was three weeks old after she became ill. She also had a number of ear infections for which she received antibiotics.
-I ate more fresh vegetables when pregnant with my allergy child. (I remember steaming that broccoli). With the other two, I reverted to more frozen vegetables.
-My allergy child was exposed to milk (which she is allergic to) when I was nursing her. I eliminated milk from my diet while nursing the other two because of the fear of the same allergy.
-I worked in the city while pregnant with my allergy child. I remained mainly in the suburbs for the other two.
-I got sick with what I thought was food poisoning only when pregnant with my allergy child.
-I often used computer wipes to clean my keyboard at work while pregnant with my allergy child. I remember that I stopped using them after I read the label. I often ate at my desk after using those wipes.
That is everything I can think of. My husband blames the antibiotics. However, I suspect she was born with her allergy since she was very fussy from the beginning. I have run into other allergy parents though who also have children with a similar history with the antibiotics.
My wife ate a normal diet, took the extra vitamins. Right after birth when trying to breastfeed, our son who is allergic would spit up milk right away and couldnt keep it down. Only thing that worked was to feed him a low protein formula (nutramigen). This did have milk though, which at the time we did know he was allergic to. He had lots of eczema, which our allergy doctor said is often a sign of some milk allergy. He also has asthma, which most of those allergic to milk have. I dont recall our son having any issues with medicines....
I had never heard of peanut allergies until about 18 years ago. Our daughter's classmate's sister had a peanut allergy and collapsed at a middle school graduation dance from eating brownies containing peanuts. I am sorry to say that she died on the way to the hospital. Apparently she had her medication with her but the dosage had not been increased since her recent spurt in height and weight. The entire community was shocked. Trying to support her devastated family was one of the most difficult experiences we've been through.
As for where these allergies come from, the predisposition to them is genetic and they're probably exacerbated by the environment. When our kids were in elementary school, they had trouble breathing on the soccer field. Their pediatrician prescribed inhalers for "seasonal asthmatic bronchitis." When I expressed surprise, he told me it was probably due to the proximity to the mountains and that they would outgrow that particular allergy, a more minor one as far as allergies are concerned.
I came across this research article yesterday about a link between mother's diet and subsequent allergies in the children- and it seems to confirm that this is a widespread change in our culture over the past few decades - that we are consuming more corn oils than in the past and that these contain a different kind of fatty acid.
Mother's Diet Influences Baby's Allergies, Research Suggests
ScienceDaily (Sep. 9, 2011) — A possible link between what a mother eats during pregnancy and the risk of her child developing allergies has been identified in new research published in this month's The Journal of Physiology.
The research found that if a mother's diet contains a certain group of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) -- such as those found in fish, walnut oil or flaxseed -- the baby's gut develops differently. The PUFAs are thought to improve how gut immune cells respond to bacteria and foreign substances, making the baby less likely to suffer from allergies.
Until now, several clinical trials have shown that fish and walnut oil supplementation in pregnant women reduces the risk of allergy in their children, but the mechanism was unknown.
"There is intense research interest in maternal diet during pregnancy. In the western diet, the group of polyunsaturated fatty acids that we have shown to help gut function are actually disappearing -- our dietary intake of fish and nut oils is being replaced by corn oils which contain a different kind of fatty acid." Said Dr Gaëlle Boudry, of the INRA research institute in Rennes, France.
I came across this research article yesterday about a link between mother's diet and subsequent allergies in the children- and it seems to confirm that this is a widespread change in our culture over the past few decades - that we are consuming more corn oils than in the past and that these contain a different kind of fatty acid.
Mother's Diet Influences Baby's Allergies, Research Suggests
ScienceDaily (Sep. 9, 2011) — A possible link between what a mother eats during pregnancy and the risk of her child developing allergies has been identified in new research published in this month's The Journal of Physiology.
The research found that if a mother's diet contains a certain group of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) -- such as those found in fish, walnut oil or flaxseed -- the baby's gut develops differently. The PUFAs are thought to improve how gut immune cells respond to bacteria and foreign substances, making the baby less likely to suffer from allergies.
Until now, several clinical trials have shown that fish and walnut oil supplementation in pregnant women reduces the risk of allergy in their children, but the mechanism was unknown.
"There is intense research interest in maternal diet during pregnancy. In the western diet, the group of polyunsaturated fatty acids that we have shown to help gut function are actually disappearing -- our dietary intake of fish and nut oils is being replaced by corn oils which contain a different kind of fatty acid." Said Dr Gaëlle Boudry, of the INRA research institute in Rennes, France.
I'm pretty sure I was told not to give my baby peanut butter until she was 1 or 2 or something (which I can understand is more of a choking hazard), but we definitely gave her a taste now and then, at least after she was one, if not before. Only enough so she could taste. And of course we had our concerns of allergies so we kept an eye on her.
At one point I read something that we're so concerned about this that people are waiting til children are older until they have anything nutty and that made it more likely to be allergic! It made me a little happy to have let her have tastes so soon.
I agree that everywhere I turn someone is allergic to something new. Peoples comments here made sense to me - the germ free lifestyle of today and vaccines. Even the Vit D mention.
I've wondered to myself in the past if it has anything to do with less people breastfeeding. I've heard so many bad things about formula. And not to say there aren't situations where formula is necessary, but I think some people choose formula for the wrong reason these days (ie laziness, scared to even try breastfeeding, etc.)
I think MORE people breastfeed now, not fewer. For a long time, in the Fifties and Sixties, formula was preferred over breastfeeding. Then groups like Le Leche started to appear and the benefits of breastfeeding were touted in magazines, and it began to swing back.
More mothers ARE choosing to breastfeed, not the other way around. I find the article about the maternal diet during pregnancy to be of great interest. Our eating habits are horrible, taking in preservatives, unhealthy oils and just general junk, as well as genetically-altered foods. I am willing to bet these are contributing factors to the burgeoning allergy problem in our country. We are not eating as nature intended anymore, even if we try. So much of our food is altered before we even buy it. Maybe shopping locally and in farmer's markets for one's food is really the best thing we can do for ourselves and our future children.
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