Friday, March 30, 2012

Holiday Time --Again


It’s Monday morning and you’re doing the final shopping for ______________(insert a Holiday here )and your –mother—aunt—cousin-- calls and says “I’m making strudel for the holiday dessert and I know that Johnny is allergic to nuts, but it really doesn’t taste good without them, so I just wanted you to know.”

You hang up the phone –and (circle one)

A. Scream B. Cry C. Laugh D. Shake your head E. All of the above


All of the above is the correct answer – and then you get the baking mix from the cupboard and read about how to make a strudel.

This is a typical holiday conversation for a food allergic family. We’ve all been there, and we all know what it feels like to NOT be able to make that special family recipe for a holiday meal. Well, as Loretta famously told Ronny in Moonstruck “Snap out of it!”

This is our life.

And this is especially true around holiday celebrations when ritual meals, steeped in tradition , are the standard fare. Food allergies can cut us off those traditions, memories—whatever you want to call those remembered moments from our past-- and not allow us to make those dishes.

But we can’t. And neither can my mother or my Aunt Sadie. Instead, I can make a menu that does not include allergens—and no one will know the difference. I can ask Cousin Pesky to bring a green salad—since that would be ‘easier’ for her—and ditch the strudel altogether. I may feel a pinch at giving up a family tradition, but what really makes the meal a tradition is that we gather our family and close friends to share it. That part doesn’t change.

As parents we must smooth the way for a happy holiday. People may mean well, but don’t have as much practice at keeping our children safe—or people may not want to change their habits. Whichever the case, your child will have a happy and safe holiday because you –and possibly only you—make the effort to prepare and bring a special meal or host a worry-free fete. That you must think ahead, prepare, and possibly reorganize tradition—that is a given in the food allergic household.

But, above all, we must remember that --while the menu may need to change-- the message of these holiday meals does not. What we are eating should not be as important as who we are eating it with— as well as the laughter and gusto we bring to the table—no matter if it’s ravioli or rice cakes and jam.

The love, the sharing, the connection are what truly matters and there is no substitute for that.

Sunday, March 18, 2012

May contain and other Food labeling statements-- do we buy or not

Food Allergy medical conference produced lots of good information --the excerpt below is from AAAI 's research abstracts on their website AAAI.org (link below)
it's about a topic near to my heart-- 'May Contain " and other labels-- here's their preliminary study results--my comments in bold italic

"Precautionary statements varied considerably in their effectiveness in deterring consumer purchasing with the statement “not suitable for” resulting in more than 80% of consumers not purchasing the food."
I've never seen this label actually-- maybe it's Canadian, and I am not. Canada has a more finely tuned ear to the voice of food allergic people-- and "Not suitable" is more direct than "May Contain"
"However, the precautionary statement “packaged in a facility that also packages products containing [allergen]” deterred purchasing in only 40% of directly affected from the general population, in 76% from the database of children with peanut allergy and advocacy groups, and in 73% of the indirectly affected. "

The statement below -- again from the research at the AAAI conference speaks directly to EDUCATION-- Those of us who are educated in Food Allergies, and who have some knowledge of the danger, are MORE VIGILANT.

"The directly affected from peanut allergy registry or the allergy advocacy associations and the indirectly affected were similarly vigilant; both were more vigilant than the directly affected randomly sampled from the general population."

So we should continue to educate educate educate-- that makes us-- and our all our children-- more safe.