Family Doesn't Get It

mrsmac08 · March 2012

Does anyone family (parents, in-laws, etc) not seem to understand your child's food allergy? We haven't been to the pediatric allergist yet, but we have done a challenge with a regular allergist, and DD (about 1 year) vomited excessively when she had milk based formula. She vomited like this when she had milk based formula about 4 months earlier as well. It was awful, she was completely lethargic and couldn't keep anything down for hours after. The allergist told us that she is allergic to dairy and should not have anything with dairy in it. I've told this to our families...yet some of them still say, oh let her try this or that...and act like I'm being mean by not letting her have something. I feel like they think I'm making it up or exaggerating things. It's just frustrating...thanks for listening to my vent. Anyone else experience anything similar?

Missbollinger · March 2012

My MIL and FIL totally don't get it. DH has Celiacs and DS2 is MSPI..holidays are a real hoot around here!

duckiegrl · March 2012

Yup. They thought it was a dairy intolerance rather than a full blown hive inducing, throat closing allergy. Until finally one day my DD was eating yogurt with grandma, had some on her hands and touched her brother. He swelled up and luckily I was able to control it with Benadryl. That's when my mom finally "got it" and realized I wasn't kidding. Just keep reminding your family and hopefully your child doesn't have to have an episode for them to I finally get it. just know that you aren't being mean by denying your child certain foods, you're just protecting their well being.

mrsmac08 · March 2012

Thanks for the responses! DD may have more of an intolerance than a true allergy...I'm not totally sure at this point, but either way, dairy products make her get very sick so I'm not taking chances.

b55c · March 2012

much smaller scale than what you're talking about but most of my friends know that i'm going completely dairy and soy free b/c of my dd. i couldn't make it to a bday party this weekend and the host insisted that i get some of the cupcakes and cookies from the party? um, why? just so that i can look at them and not be able to eat them? or did she think that i could have just one and risk having a very irritable and irritated dd for the next few weeks? think people! ok...rant over:)

miaomi · March 2012

We have CONSTANT issues and it's very frustrating. I have a friend who's little girl is allergic to dairy and her mom keeps confusing dairy with egg. Like, she won't give her eggs because she can't have dairy, but will give her CHEESE! WTF?

After 2years and 2 kids with allergies (all in two years, lol), I can tell you it is very annoying and hard to deal with, but in a way, it gets easier. It gets to the point where you know who and where you can trust your lo and when you need to guard her. And hopefully, they will figure it out! Try looking for some litature or something to give them...

americana · March 2012

Yea we have the problem of having to keep reminding people to read ingredient labels. Soy is in EVERYTHING, I swear. So it's an ongoing battle. I never realized how many people really don't understand food allergies. Some people only have a reaction to eating the allergen - one of our DDs has this reaction to soy, dairy and eggs. And others can react just by coming in contact with the food or being in the vicinity of it -- both of our DDs have this kind of reaction to peanuts. It's really hard for people to understand for some reason, because "[they] never heard of food allergies when [they] were kids."

ashley0908 · March 2012

I have the same issue all of the time with my in-laws. Ds has an anaphylaxis reaction to wheat, barley, oats, and rye (same ingredients that celibacy have to avoid), which people get it confused with celiac disease, which is totally different. my SIL has celiace disease and they are just not as cautious with DS because they treat his allergy the same as hers. My MIL even brought over marinated chicken last weekend, swore it was wheat free (I provided an ingredients list to avoid), but when I looked at the label, wheat was clearly one of the first ingredients! I was so frustrated and upset. What if I had trusted her and fed it to my DS? They just don't take it serious enough (even though they know that DS lost consciousness twice in the hospital a couple of months ago). Very had to explain to people the difference between an intolerance and a true allergy!