OT: a food allergy alert when one sibling has them

[erinch]

I've often posted about my food allergic DS: milk, eggs, nuts, treenuts. He can eat fish and seafood. (I developed an allergy to "finny" fish in my twenties, but can eat shellfish.)

Our DS, age 9, is drip dry healthy--no asthma. No food allergies. Until tonight. She ate 2 tiny baby shrimp and an hour later started with gastro and heart palpitation symptoms. She did not go into a full anaphylactic episode, but we are assuming the reactive pattern has been "set" and will escalate. As far as I know she had one previous exposure to a bite of shrimp a few years ago and didn't like it.

Due to the extent of her brother's allergies, we did not introduce any nut or peanut products to her until she was age 6, and she tolerated those fine. I really wish we'd held off shellfish entirely until she was in her teens.

It only goes to show that when it runs in the family, one must always be alert.

 

[laughinplace199]

Thanks for sharing your story. I'm so glad that your DD is ok now.

My DD5 is allergic to peanuts and tree nuts. We gave DS3 some Reese's Pieces recently (this is what DD reacted to when she was 3) to see if he was allergic as well, but he was fine.

I think I was so relieved that he didn't have a reaction, that I just sort of assumed that we/he would never have to worry about him having food allergies. Your post has reminded me that we must always be diligent since food allergies can develop at any time. Thanks for the reminder!

 

[welovedis]

Thanks for the info, hope all is ok with your kids now.

Another thing to consider is that food allergies can occur at any time in your life. I had no history of food allergies until 2 years ago when I became ill and no one could pin-point a specific food or issue. After a few months I was diagnosed with a fairly uncommon stomach disease (eosinophilic gastroenteritis) and multiple food allergies (eggs, bananas, tree nuts, peanuts, oysters, & mussels). And now, 2 years later, my disease is in remission and my allergies appear to be gone-no reaction with food challenges and skin prick/patch testing.

My hope is that someday more people will realize that food allergies are not always something that occurs for your entire lifetime. You can experience the onset at any point in your life. I think there are lots of drs out there convincing people they have other ailments (ulcers, GERD, etc.) when they really may be experiencing allergies.

Sorry to go off-topic OP, but glad you saw the signs in your DD and knew what to do. Unfortunately for me, no one in my family has any allergies at all (except DS with his envrio ones) so I had no clue what to look for.

 

[erinch]

Karen, you're not off-topic on my off-topic.

No one knows why food allergies are escalating so dramatically, and it's pretty scary. Does anyone over 40 remember so many of them when we were kids? I don't think I'd even heard of food allergies till I had my fish episode.

The thing I've been struggling with is the internal "thing" I discovered in myself last night....

Apparently I believed I had a pact with the universe.
I would do WHATEVER it takes to keep my DS safe and alive.
Over his 17 years that has been A LOT. The quest which the rest of life is organized around.

In return for that, my deal with the universe was that the DD which I finally dared to have, and who turned out to be asthma and catastrophic allergy free, would be a DRAMA PRINCESS QUEEN, but that I wouldn't have to worry about what she ate.

Apparently the universe forgot to listen. So thank you to all of you for listening on its behalf.