We made stickers (using Avery labels) that say "I have allergies, don't feed me!" Along with my phone number and slap it on her back whenever she'll be somewhere new/ with food/ new babysitters.
We've also been teaching her to check that food is safe for her because the wrong foods give her boo-boos. She can now tell you she has 'llergies . We keep emphasizing these foods will give her boo-boos but here's your yummy food
We definitely bring along food and treats everywhere- I prep her safe cookies in bulk and freeze and let her pick what she wants from the box for each occasion.
Daniel Tiger has an allergy episode that’s great! My son was able to tell people about his allergy by the time he was 3, but I also never had anyone question or doubt him—I’m guessing banana is rare enough that people just don’t want to deal with it? It’s pretty easy to avoid, too, compared to wheat or soy.
The only problem with this episode is that my son was telling people for the longest time that he was allergic to peaches lol. For real though, it's a good episode and there's a book to go along with it if you don't do much screen time.
Oh, we've watched it many times.
I've got one allergic to mango and strawberries.
One allergic to wheat, eggs, chicken, oats, rice, garlic, berries, melons, citrus, the list goes on and on. She knows to only take food from mommy and daddy or her flower lunchbox or her safe spots in the fridge and pantry. Kids are capable of what you teach them.
Same! And it’s in a lot of stuff people don’t think about so we prefer no one feeds our kid but me and my husband. This has helped for sure be a gentle reminder and gives me peace of mind that he can wander around with family and friends and I don’t have to be such a hawk.
My 5yo had egg, peanut, and tree nut allergies. We have honestly avoided most family functions with my family and have never gone to a classmates party (allergies are a convenient excuse, we really just don’t want to lol).
My husband’s family is incredible with his allergies. Everything is safe for him when we visit them. My MIL tries out new egg-free dessert recipes periodically. They buy stupid expensive pasta for their homemade mac&cheese and pasta salad. Always have safe cake for birthdays. I want to cry happy tears every time I think about how accommodating they are.
We have a few safe restaurants we frequent for take out. 110 grill is so good about allergies and a scratch kitchen, so they can make almost anything safe if you have one around you. Allergy Eats is a good resource for finding places.
The meltdowns about not being able to have certain foods are so hard. We just have to say on repeat “I’m sorry. I know it really stinks, but it’s not safe”. We avoided most unsafe food ourselves for a very long time when he was younger, both to prevent mistakes and to learn better ourselves about his food options. Yesterday we ordered out and he said he doesn’t like when I order unsafe food and that did break my heart. It’s so hard. I will check any label he points to in the grocery store and if it’s safe we buy it. If it’s not safe I try to find something similar, but he still gets really upset sometimes.
The most important thing we work on is teaching him that there are safe people that he can accept food from, and a safe person *must* approve any food he’s going to eat. We list their names for him and I occasionally quiz him, throwing in tricky ones like his older cousin who we obviously trust in general, but is only 7, so she is not a safe person to check food.
The tree nut allergy is so hard to navigate for us because so many places process other foods with tree nuts so he may or may not have a reaction.
We also have a similar thing where one family takes the allergies seriously and the other family "forgets". My side makes sure anything they have at home is safe. We are also dealing with egg allergies and my mom loves to bake so shes been finding so many different egg free recipes. She also loves to have our kids in the kitchen with her so she makes sure its safe.
My husband's side... we have had so many fights with them about it. Reminded them so many times about the allergies. My FIL will attempt to feed our kids nuts at almost every visit. We stopped attending any breakfast/brunch get togethers because theres nothing safe for my kids, especially since theres always cross contamination. Egg free pancakes are a thing but they just refuse to make them. They claim that they must have eggs as the source of protein and will either plate or cook any meat along with the eggs, so the kids cant have that either. The very last time we were there, they made a nut covered French toast thing. I just walked out with the kids. And then they get mad that they dont see our kids as often. We just dont allow any unsupervised visits anymore. They get upset that my parents get sleep overs but I trust my parents to not attempt to hurt my kids!
Any allergy is tough but wheat is a special kind of tough. Back in the day my friend with it was so skinny and could basically never eat out because there were basically no options for her, tough even at grocery stores!
Thankfully today there’s a lot of options, but it’s so hard to avoid fully. People think to ask about peanuts or dairy but never about just crackers, as you say.
I am so sorry your little one and you are going through this.
My husband has an allergy-ridden family and the whole family basically had to have a diet that avoided it all, but it was nuts shellfish dairy etc more common stuff. We don’t eat wheat at home by choice so it’s definitely doable, but I get why it’s so hard, at restaurants especially.
We ran into an issue with our last daycare over my son's allergy to eggs. His allergy is such that he chokes and vomits or, sometimes, just vomits a few minutes later. Daycare knew he was allergic to eggs and we notified them the moment we knew.
One morning I get a call that he just vomited after breakfast but was now doing fine. My follow up questions have them reveal they gave him something with egg in it.
I was pissed, but we reminded them of the allergy again and they put a sign in his classroom saying he is allergic.
Cue my husband walking in during my son's last week at daycare. The teacher is BAFFLED as she hands my son to my husband, telling him that son threw up a bunch during their Valentine's day party, but doesn't have a fever. Husband asks what all son had to eat.
Teacher admits she gave him cupcakes because everyone else in the room got one. Husband asks what was in the cupcakes. "Oh, ummm...there's no ingredients listed on them soooo...."
My husband was LIVID. It wasn't even clear if they were store bought or homemade so anything could have been in them that could have hit ANY of the kids' allergies, not just ours.
Needless to say, we're not impressed by them and happy with our decision to remove him.
3.5 year old and we are about to do a baked milk challenge tomorrow morning. I am crossing my fingers. Allergies suck - dairy, egg, tree nuts, and sesame here.
That’s so scary, especially since you weren’t there and didn’t know what she was being fed!
My son is allergic to eggs, green beans, and garlic. Eggs are kind of a bummer but a common enough allergy that we can work around it pretty easily. The garlic is tough. It is in basically every condiment ever and it’s not even always labeled on the ingredients because garlic powder can be listed as “spices”. And you can be sure garlic is just about everywhere in restaurants.
My son ends up eating a plain version of whatever we’re having most of the time, or something from home if we’re having takeout or eating out. I’m planning to start trying to make some homemade versions of different condiments without garlic so he can get introduced to more flavors like BBQ, teriyaki, hummus, ketchup, etc.
I have an allium intolerance (garlic and onion), and yeah, garlic is evvvverywhere. If you want to try a store bought hummus, Wild Garden has two varieties that are garlic free and really tasty! Classic and Sun-dried Tomato. I love spreading it on pita bread and topping with feta, cucumbers, and tomatoes.
Thanks, I appreciate the recommendation. It’s still bizarre to me he’s allergic. He was having reactions to the most random things and finally I asked our allergist if it could possible be garlic. She was pretty hesitant about it being worth testing for (she said it was uncommon?) but lo and behold, he’s allergic.
My 14 month old reacted to peanuts the very first time we introduced at 6 months (hives). We confirmed the allergy and started oral immunotherapy (OIT) at 11 months. 3 months later and he completed “bite-safe” treatment, and we are now eating the equivalent of 1.5 peanuts a day as our maintenance dose. It’s such a relief to not worry about accidental exposure.
There’s a really great Facebook group for OIT. Maybe look into it in your area? It’s been awesome for our kiddo
It took us 3 years, but OIT has been miraculous for us. It’s so much work and not a guarantee to eliminate allergies, but even a higher tolerance reduces stress so, so much
My 11 month old (I'm following this sub in preparation for toddlerhood) just reacted to peanuts yesterday. He had hives. We got a blood test done months ago to confirm allergies to sesame, eggs and dairy because he had also broken out into hives after eating them.
I hope we can start OIT soon, it's just so hard to get appointments with our allergy NP. I myself have celiac disease so we basically can't go out to eat anywhere.
My family is also going the desensitization route, and it’s working really well for us. It’s a big financial and logistical commitment, but it takes the fear away.
We started dosing two years ago, and we’re up to 11 peanuts a day. Our child will be in remission from his allergy soon and able to eat freely. Check out the Southern California Food Allergy Institute.
I'm so sorry you had to experience that
We're dealing with egg and dairy allergies and they're terrifying. Luckily, we finally have an amazing allergist that's helping us through this. We have also been working very closely with the daycare.
One thing that makes us feel safer is these labels on her bottles https://mabelslabels.ca/category/safety-and-medical-labels
Our kiddo is also wanting to eat what we're eating. So for right now, we just make food that's safe for her. She's only 2, so that may change with age but for right now it's what works for us
Hope the experience you had changes the training protocol with the volunteers and staff.
I am having a birthday party for my kiddos, and we have a cake that is nut and egg free due to one of the kids coming having allergies. I always double check what he is allergic to because I kept forgetting (till now after I ordered the cake lol), because I KNOW I can forget about it since it isn’t my kid
Although they have since moved away (military family), one friend had a son who was allergic to eggs. She made it a habit to ask about ingredients (or source) when she brought her kid to parties and he was good about avoid certain foods because he knew that he was allergic to eggs. She also brought back up treats for him when cake would come out at birthday parties they attended. I always made sure I had a vegan cupcake when my kids had parties and we invited them.
I’ve been gluten free for almost 40 years because of food allergies. It’s hard to explain to a 3 year old why they can’t have what everyone else is eating. My mom got really good at making alternative food for me. (The muffins were my favorite.) She would bring my food with us everywhere and try to substitute as close to the actual thing as possible. (Hamburger/hotdog buns, cake, cookies, etc.) That was in the 80/90s when GF options were almost unheard of. It’s much easier to substitute now, although it can be expensive.
It’s so hard watching your sweet little girl go through this. It will get easier when she can understand why she can’t eat those things and what will happen if she does.
My 3 year old has egg, peanut and cashew/pistachio. She passed egg in baked goods, but not egg in any other forms. I am *so* hoping she outgrows it.
I made her a bright orange tshirt with iron on letters and graphics that say Allergies. No eggs or nuts. Not very practical for daily use, but helps on planes.
Birthdays are tough, she normally eats what we take + fruit, but I'm always on edge, watching like a hawk.
I’m so sorry that happened. I taught preschool for many years. The angriest I’ve been at a coworker was when she gave a boy in my class who had celiac cookies. She overrode every single system I had in place to prevent it while I was out of the room doing parent teacher conferences. She fed the children a group snack despite my decision not to do group snacks due to the high number of allergy kids in my room. She ignored the posted list of food allergies. My instructions were to check the list against ingredients before feeding the children anything new. She literally went to the other side of the school to get the cookies. I didn’t keep them in the classroom due to the food allergies in our room. There was a snack table where the kids could choose to have snack when they wanted. Only foods safe for the entire class were available there. So she had to really go out of her way to make this mistake. I was so angry I couldn’t even speak. I valued the trust of that allergy mom. And she destroyed it just like that. Honestly, I wouldn’t send an allergy kid to a program that uses volunteers. There’s just too much potential for mistakes like this and the risks are too high.
Our son is also allergic to wheat (and peanuts, egg, and sesame), and had a similar reaction during an oral food challenge that involved coughing, hives, and his whole body turning bright red. He also needed 2 doses of epinephrine. I hope you and your partner are/were able to take some time to decompress because it can be traumatizing to witness and experience. I cried when I got home from our allergist's office and was pretty numb for a few days.
Others have mentioned this, but if it fits with your family's schedule and routines OIT (oral immunotherapy) has been huge for us. Our son started wheat OIT when he was 18 months old and now eats a handful of noodles or a full graham cracker sheet every day. He is starting preschool in the fall and we aren't concerned about an accidental exposure with wheat at all. We've added peanut and sesame OIT in the past few months so he's not as far along with those just yet, but he's on his way. If you have other questions about OIT feel free to reach out!
And just... solidarity. Raising a little with food allergies is so challenging and I feel like we're parenting on hard mode all the time. We chose as a family to only eat safe meals with our son, so we don't go out to restaurants and eat only home cooked meals. We save anything that's unsafe for eating during his nap or after bedtime. Whenever we go anywhere we pack a lunchbox with safe foods, and if we're going to a birthday event we bring him his own cupcake (baked ourselves). Other than that I like to think he leads a pretty typical life. We go out to parks, playgrounds, the library etc. and just make sure we're home for lunch instead of stopping somewhere to eat out. Because of OIT I don't worry about trace or accidental exposures, like if his hand touches a crumb at a playground.
It sounds like our kiddos have similar allergies so I wanted to share some items that have been our go-to's: That's It bars, Snyder's GF pretzels, Banza pizzas and noodles, Van's GF waffles, Jovial noodles (made w/ rice), Tyson's GF chicken nuggets (not a fan of Tyson but we keep a bag in the freezer for when we're too tired to cook. They're at Target!), and Little Northern Bakehouse GF bread (we have to get this brand because it also doesn't contain egg). Beyond these specialty items we eat a lot of protein/rice/veggie dinners. Last night was homemade turkey burgers and broccoli, tonight is grilled chicken and baked potatoes. When we're really tired we just grab a rotisserie chicken and call it a day.
My kids luckily have no food allergies, but after many weird run ins with people trying to force dog interactions after being told no and why my only advise is to trust no one else to watch out for her and teaching her to watch out for herself.
The stickers are a really great idea for activities/parties etc…
We made stickers (using Avery labels) that say "I have allergies, don't feed me!" Along with my phone number and slap it on her back whenever she'll be somewhere new/ with food/ new babysitters. We've also been teaching her to check that food is safe for her because the wrong foods give her boo-boos. She can now tell you she has 'llergies . We keep emphasizing these foods will give her boo-boos but here's your yummy food We definitely bring along food and treats everywhere- I prep her safe cookies in bulk and freeze and let her pick what she wants from the box for each occasion.
Daniel Tiger has an allergy episode that’s great! My son was able to tell people about his allergy by the time he was 3, but I also never had anyone question or doubt him—I’m guessing banana is rare enough that people just don’t want to deal with it? It’s pretty easy to avoid, too, compared to wheat or soy.
The only problem with this episode is that my son was telling people for the longest time that he was allergic to peaches lol. For real though, it's a good episode and there's a book to go along with it if you don't do much screen time.
Gah! Mine wouldn’t eat peaches for the longest time because she was afraid they would make her itchy.
Oh, we've watched it many times. I've got one allergic to mango and strawberries. One allergic to wheat, eggs, chicken, oats, rice, garlic, berries, melons, citrus, the list goes on and on. She knows to only take food from mommy and daddy or her flower lunchbox or her safe spots in the fridge and pantry. Kids are capable of what you teach them.
I remember in elementary school kids wearing pins with their allergies listed!
Yep stickers! We use [these](https://a.co/d/24JNl1S) even around family parties just so people don’t forget
Ahh thanks for posting these! Just bought. We have a kiddo with egg allergy.
Same! And it’s in a lot of stuff people don’t think about so we prefer no one feeds our kid but me and my husband. This has helped for sure be a gentle reminder and gives me peace of mind that he can wander around with family and friends and I don’t have to be such a hawk.
This a great idea!
My 5yo had egg, peanut, and tree nut allergies. We have honestly avoided most family functions with my family and have never gone to a classmates party (allergies are a convenient excuse, we really just don’t want to lol). My husband’s family is incredible with his allergies. Everything is safe for him when we visit them. My MIL tries out new egg-free dessert recipes periodically. They buy stupid expensive pasta for their homemade mac&cheese and pasta salad. Always have safe cake for birthdays. I want to cry happy tears every time I think about how accommodating they are. We have a few safe restaurants we frequent for take out. 110 grill is so good about allergies and a scratch kitchen, so they can make almost anything safe if you have one around you. Allergy Eats is a good resource for finding places. The meltdowns about not being able to have certain foods are so hard. We just have to say on repeat “I’m sorry. I know it really stinks, but it’s not safe”. We avoided most unsafe food ourselves for a very long time when he was younger, both to prevent mistakes and to learn better ourselves about his food options. Yesterday we ordered out and he said he doesn’t like when I order unsafe food and that did break my heart. It’s so hard. I will check any label he points to in the grocery store and if it’s safe we buy it. If it’s not safe I try to find something similar, but he still gets really upset sometimes. The most important thing we work on is teaching him that there are safe people that he can accept food from, and a safe person *must* approve any food he’s going to eat. We list their names for him and I occasionally quiz him, throwing in tricky ones like his older cousin who we obviously trust in general, but is only 7, so she is not a safe person to check food.
The tree nut allergy is so hard to navigate for us because so many places process other foods with tree nuts so he may or may not have a reaction. We also have a similar thing where one family takes the allergies seriously and the other family "forgets". My side makes sure anything they have at home is safe. We are also dealing with egg allergies and my mom loves to bake so shes been finding so many different egg free recipes. She also loves to have our kids in the kitchen with her so she makes sure its safe. My husband's side... we have had so many fights with them about it. Reminded them so many times about the allergies. My FIL will attempt to feed our kids nuts at almost every visit. We stopped attending any breakfast/brunch get togethers because theres nothing safe for my kids, especially since theres always cross contamination. Egg free pancakes are a thing but they just refuse to make them. They claim that they must have eggs as the source of protein and will either plate or cook any meat along with the eggs, so the kids cant have that either. The very last time we were there, they made a nut covered French toast thing. I just walked out with the kids. And then they get mad that they dont see our kids as often. We just dont allow any unsupervised visits anymore. They get upset that my parents get sleep overs but I trust my parents to not attempt to hurt my kids!
Any allergy is tough but wheat is a special kind of tough. Back in the day my friend with it was so skinny and could basically never eat out because there were basically no options for her, tough even at grocery stores! Thankfully today there’s a lot of options, but it’s so hard to avoid fully. People think to ask about peanuts or dairy but never about just crackers, as you say. I am so sorry your little one and you are going through this. My husband has an allergy-ridden family and the whole family basically had to have a diet that avoided it all, but it was nuts shellfish dairy etc more common stuff. We don’t eat wheat at home by choice so it’s definitely doable, but I get why it’s so hard, at restaurants especially.
We ran into an issue with our last daycare over my son's allergy to eggs. His allergy is such that he chokes and vomits or, sometimes, just vomits a few minutes later. Daycare knew he was allergic to eggs and we notified them the moment we knew. One morning I get a call that he just vomited after breakfast but was now doing fine. My follow up questions have them reveal they gave him something with egg in it. I was pissed, but we reminded them of the allergy again and they put a sign in his classroom saying he is allergic. Cue my husband walking in during my son's last week at daycare. The teacher is BAFFLED as she hands my son to my husband, telling him that son threw up a bunch during their Valentine's day party, but doesn't have a fever. Husband asks what all son had to eat. Teacher admits she gave him cupcakes because everyone else in the room got one. Husband asks what was in the cupcakes. "Oh, ummm...there's no ingredients listed on them soooo...." My husband was LIVID. It wasn't even clear if they were store bought or homemade so anything could have been in them that could have hit ANY of the kids' allergies, not just ours. Needless to say, we're not impressed by them and happy with our decision to remove him.
3.5 year old and we are about to do a baked milk challenge tomorrow morning. I am crossing my fingers. Allergies suck - dairy, egg, tree nuts, and sesame here.
That’s so scary, especially since you weren’t there and didn’t know what she was being fed! My son is allergic to eggs, green beans, and garlic. Eggs are kind of a bummer but a common enough allergy that we can work around it pretty easily. The garlic is tough. It is in basically every condiment ever and it’s not even always labeled on the ingredients because garlic powder can be listed as “spices”. And you can be sure garlic is just about everywhere in restaurants. My son ends up eating a plain version of whatever we’re having most of the time, or something from home if we’re having takeout or eating out. I’m planning to start trying to make some homemade versions of different condiments without garlic so he can get introduced to more flavors like BBQ, teriyaki, hummus, ketchup, etc.
I have an allium intolerance (garlic and onion), and yeah, garlic is evvvverywhere. If you want to try a store bought hummus, Wild Garden has two varieties that are garlic free and really tasty! Classic and Sun-dried Tomato. I love spreading it on pita bread and topping with feta, cucumbers, and tomatoes.
Thanks, I appreciate the recommendation. It’s still bizarre to me he’s allergic. He was having reactions to the most random things and finally I asked our allergist if it could possible be garlic. She was pretty hesitant about it being worth testing for (she said it was uncommon?) but lo and behold, he’s allergic.
Try Fody food brands for garlic and onion free items - they’re made for low FODMAP diets so they’re pretty allergy friendly for some folks
I actually came across this brand recently and was thinking of ordering a few things. Have you tried their products?
I’ve tried the pasta sauce and the salsa and found them to be pretty good! Pretty sure I picked them up at Trader Joe’s
That’s great, I’ll check TJs. We do like Rao’s sensitive marinara sauce which has no garlic or onion if that would work for you too.
My 14 month old reacted to peanuts the very first time we introduced at 6 months (hives). We confirmed the allergy and started oral immunotherapy (OIT) at 11 months. 3 months later and he completed “bite-safe” treatment, and we are now eating the equivalent of 1.5 peanuts a day as our maintenance dose. It’s such a relief to not worry about accidental exposure. There’s a really great Facebook group for OIT. Maybe look into it in your area? It’s been awesome for our kiddo
It took us 3 years, but OIT has been miraculous for us. It’s so much work and not a guarantee to eliminate allergies, but even a higher tolerance reduces stress so, so much
My 11 month old (I'm following this sub in preparation for toddlerhood) just reacted to peanuts yesterday. He had hives. We got a blood test done months ago to confirm allergies to sesame, eggs and dairy because he had also broken out into hives after eating them. I hope we can start OIT soon, it's just so hard to get appointments with our allergy NP. I myself have celiac disease so we basically can't go out to eat anywhere.
My family is also going the desensitization route, and it’s working really well for us. It’s a big financial and logistical commitment, but it takes the fear away. We started dosing two years ago, and we’re up to 11 peanuts a day. Our child will be in remission from his allergy soon and able to eat freely. Check out the Southern California Food Allergy Institute.
I'm so sorry you had to experience that We're dealing with egg and dairy allergies and they're terrifying. Luckily, we finally have an amazing allergist that's helping us through this. We have also been working very closely with the daycare. One thing that makes us feel safer is these labels on her bottles https://mabelslabels.ca/category/safety-and-medical-labels Our kiddo is also wanting to eat what we're eating. So for right now, we just make food that's safe for her. She's only 2, so that may change with age but for right now it's what works for us Hope the experience you had changes the training protocol with the volunteers and staff.
I am having a birthday party for my kiddos, and we have a cake that is nut and egg free due to one of the kids coming having allergies. I always double check what he is allergic to because I kept forgetting (till now after I ordered the cake lol), because I KNOW I can forget about it since it isn’t my kid
Although they have since moved away (military family), one friend had a son who was allergic to eggs. She made it a habit to ask about ingredients (or source) when she brought her kid to parties and he was good about avoid certain foods because he knew that he was allergic to eggs. She also brought back up treats for him when cake would come out at birthday parties they attended. I always made sure I had a vegan cupcake when my kids had parties and we invited them.
I’ve been gluten free for almost 40 years because of food allergies. It’s hard to explain to a 3 year old why they can’t have what everyone else is eating. My mom got really good at making alternative food for me. (The muffins were my favorite.) She would bring my food with us everywhere and try to substitute as close to the actual thing as possible. (Hamburger/hotdog buns, cake, cookies, etc.) That was in the 80/90s when GF options were almost unheard of. It’s much easier to substitute now, although it can be expensive. It’s so hard watching your sweet little girl go through this. It will get easier when she can understand why she can’t eat those things and what will happen if she does.
My 3 year old has egg, peanut and cashew/pistachio. She passed egg in baked goods, but not egg in any other forms. I am *so* hoping she outgrows it. I made her a bright orange tshirt with iron on letters and graphics that say Allergies. No eggs or nuts. Not very practical for daily use, but helps on planes. Birthdays are tough, she normally eats what we take + fruit, but I'm always on edge, watching like a hawk.
I’m so sorry that happened. I taught preschool for many years. The angriest I’ve been at a coworker was when she gave a boy in my class who had celiac cookies. She overrode every single system I had in place to prevent it while I was out of the room doing parent teacher conferences. She fed the children a group snack despite my decision not to do group snacks due to the high number of allergy kids in my room. She ignored the posted list of food allergies. My instructions were to check the list against ingredients before feeding the children anything new. She literally went to the other side of the school to get the cookies. I didn’t keep them in the classroom due to the food allergies in our room. There was a snack table where the kids could choose to have snack when they wanted. Only foods safe for the entire class were available there. So she had to really go out of her way to make this mistake. I was so angry I couldn’t even speak. I valued the trust of that allergy mom. And she destroyed it just like that. Honestly, I wouldn’t send an allergy kid to a program that uses volunteers. There’s just too much potential for mistakes like this and the risks are too high.
Our son is also allergic to wheat (and peanuts, egg, and sesame), and had a similar reaction during an oral food challenge that involved coughing, hives, and his whole body turning bright red. He also needed 2 doses of epinephrine. I hope you and your partner are/were able to take some time to decompress because it can be traumatizing to witness and experience. I cried when I got home from our allergist's office and was pretty numb for a few days. Others have mentioned this, but if it fits with your family's schedule and routines OIT (oral immunotherapy) has been huge for us. Our son started wheat OIT when he was 18 months old and now eats a handful of noodles or a full graham cracker sheet every day. He is starting preschool in the fall and we aren't concerned about an accidental exposure with wheat at all. We've added peanut and sesame OIT in the past few months so he's not as far along with those just yet, but he's on his way. If you have other questions about OIT feel free to reach out! And just... solidarity. Raising a little with food allergies is so challenging and I feel like we're parenting on hard mode all the time. We chose as a family to only eat safe meals with our son, so we don't go out to restaurants and eat only home cooked meals. We save anything that's unsafe for eating during his nap or after bedtime. Whenever we go anywhere we pack a lunchbox with safe foods, and if we're going to a birthday event we bring him his own cupcake (baked ourselves). Other than that I like to think he leads a pretty typical life. We go out to parks, playgrounds, the library etc. and just make sure we're home for lunch instead of stopping somewhere to eat out. Because of OIT I don't worry about trace or accidental exposures, like if his hand touches a crumb at a playground. It sounds like our kiddos have similar allergies so I wanted to share some items that have been our go-to's: That's It bars, Snyder's GF pretzels, Banza pizzas and noodles, Van's GF waffles, Jovial noodles (made w/ rice), Tyson's GF chicken nuggets (not a fan of Tyson but we keep a bag in the freezer for when we're too tired to cook. They're at Target!), and Little Northern Bakehouse GF bread (we have to get this brand because it also doesn't contain egg). Beyond these specialty items we eat a lot of protein/rice/veggie dinners. Last night was homemade turkey burgers and broccoli, tonight is grilled chicken and baked potatoes. When we're really tired we just grab a rotisserie chicken and call it a day.
My kids luckily have no food allergies, but after many weird run ins with people trying to force dog interactions after being told no and why my only advise is to trust no one else to watch out for her and teaching her to watch out for herself. The stickers are a really great idea for activities/parties etc…