I do not have any children yet, but I work with them on a daily basis. I completely agree that it is so very important to help protect these kiddos that cannot advocate for themselves (yet)…..it takes a village, right? Thanks for writing this. Hopefully it will help some of those parents that complain about making changes for other children’s allergies.

Thank you. As a peanut- allergy mom, I hate the restrictions that my child’s allergy places on the children around her (think:daycare) . But I’ll be the biggest burden in the world to protect my child. It is nice to get a little understanding from someone on the other side.

My husband scoffed at me, but I made separate plastic storage boxes of Halloween treats this year: one with the chocolate and goodies, and one full of peanut/gluten free fruit snacks.

I don’t think we got any kids that cared one way or the other, but the thought was there. I would be terrified about Trick or Treating if I had a toddler with an allergy!

My sons school is nut free for everything from the snacks we bring when it’s our assigned day to my son’s lunch that is packed just for him. I had never thought of not giving him any peanut butter before school though. I feel like a dunce for doing it now though – one of his classmates has a pretty severe nut allergy.

My daughter, now 6 and in first grade, has a dairy allergy. I’ve never expected anyone to make changes to their birthday party or playdate because of her. We packed her own lunch and snacks and brought our own treats to birthday parties. However, after a few months her friend’s parents started ordering cheese-less pizza or vegan cakes for her. He were thrilled because to us this was a statement of how much they liked us. But that was our experience in CA. With a few exceptions, we have experienced more push back since moving to MS. Here we get the parents who send chocholate chip cookies to the class for a treat knowing she can’t have them. The people who say why should I send a dairy free snack when there’s only one child that needs that? It’s been a shock since we had gotten used to people taking a solar approach to the author’s and it’s hard on my daughter. So we still bring our own food and cupcake to the party-I now keep them in the freezer-but now we get weird looks from the other party goers.

EL- the crazy thing is the food allergies have been since childhood and i just developed a latex/spandex/elastic allergy during my 3rd trimester! i never had a problem with latex before that!

And it’s just plain kind to take food allergies (and religions) into consideration. I had a head-smack horrifying moment at our annual holiday party last week when I realized that almost all the meats we were serving were pork products… which none of our Jewish friends could eat. Next year, I will certainly plan better!

I have an allergy to mold and mildew. Peanuts are the mildewiest (word?) food ever. Peppers tend to have mold on their cores. What most people cut off and use the rest of the food will send me to the hospital so I am super vigilant. Most people get really annoyed and frustrated with me until they witness an attack. Knowing this and having friends who their whole family is gluten sensitive as well as an aunt with severe mushroom and peanut allergies, I’ve realigned a lot of my cooking and hostessing patterns to ensure everyone has a good time.
I can only imagine the added stress of having a child with an allergy. Even though My child is perfectly healthy so far, I’m definitely a proponent of Peanut free schools. If your child loves peanutbutter that much, than make that their afternoon snack. They will LIVE without peanuts for half the day, while another kid may not live if your kid brings them.

Growing up, my best friend was allergic to tree nuts. I have worked my whole professional career in education. These two things have made me very conscious about food allergies, cross contamination, etc., since I was 14. To me, it is very simple. What I choose to eat COULD KILL SOMEONE. How is that hard to understand and have the desire to accommodate? KILL THEM.

Hell, even if all my pb sandwich would do (or just the oils left the my hands that transfer to the book I just handed to my student) is make them SICK, why would I do it? Why can’t I just wash my hands or not eat at my desk or bring something different that day, etc?

As a parent now, I am certain that I will be the same way with my chidren’s friends and classmates. My kid’s birthday ain’t so damned important that your child should feel ostrasized (did I spell that right?) or get sick or worse. WTF is wrong with people these days that they don’t get that?

Now, having said that…. I still remember the Kindergartener who looked me in the eye and said, “Thank you, but I can’t eat that. I’ll go get my snack from my mom” when I was handing out the cups of apple cider on the field trip to the orchard. (For the record, I’m the music teacher. I just mooched my way onto the trip b/c I was bored and wanted an excuse to get out with the kids for some Fall fun! I am not his classroom teacher who, obviously, should know about his allergy.) Either way, though, at 5 years old, this kid was his own advocate. Way to go on that one, Mom-of-this-kid!!!!!

I loved this article. I had this same issue with my mom when I was planning my wedding! I have one friend like you who can’t have ANY seafood. She can be around it and (with the exception of shrimp) can touch it but she can’t eat it or eat anything that’s been contaminated with it. Which sucked for her grown up cause she’s from New Orleans. My husband’s lactose intolerant. Milk products won’t kill him but without a lactaid can make him very very ill, like mimic food poisoning ill. Sometimes even with the lactaid. He can have cake but not cheese based stuff. He has a friend who’s as allergic to eggs as you and my friend are to seafood (so no cake, potatosalad, or coleslaw for him). I also had a bridesmaid and her fiance who are Jewish who keep Kosher. She actually said “they just choose not to eat pork they can eat it.” Um no mom they can’t. 1: it’s against their religion, 2: considering the fact they were raised as Orthodox Jews they’ve NEVER had pork. It’d be like me eating monkey brain, yeah I could eat it but it’d probably make me very ill cause my stomaches not used to it. My mom was determined to have a fish fry for the rehearsal dinner and pork bbq for the reception and put out any leftover fish. She also only wanted to have coleslaw and potatosalad as the sides. I finally convinced her to do chicken bbq (lol said it’d be better for her diet) and we still had the fish fry for the rehearsal (luckily my seafood allergic friend didn’t have to come to the rehearsal and I talked my mom into keeping the leftover fish in the fridge. I also talked her into doing homemade baked beans (so we could leave out the pork) and a salad. I looked at her like she was crazy when she said what she wanted and said “are you just trying to make it so NO one including me can eat at the reception?” (I under no circumstance will eat coleslaw. I like cabbage and I like mayo I do not like my mayo on my cabbage. I argued with her for over a year on the food. She just didn’t get that with the exception of my bridesmaid and her fiance what she wanted to fix could KILL my friends and make my now husband VERY VERY ILL. That was the only thing I was a bridezilla about. I didn’t want an ambulance showing up at my wedding and I didn’t wanna spend my wedding night in the hotel bathroom rubbing my husbands back while he vomited. IDK what I’m going to do with her when we have kids (we’re planning on TTCing in a year, we wanna start saving so we can have everything we need and can cover medical expenses that the insurance won’t plus be outta debt…at least outta debt minus the mortgage and car payment) and they have my husbands allergy…or Goddess forbid a more serious one.