Living With Allergy
Living with a food allergy can be challenging, especially when one or more family members are allergic, the allergy/allergies are severe, or if there are multiple allergies.
Common issues are:
- Shopping for food – it can take longer and be more expensive.
- Planning meals and cooking - it can get complicated.
- Talking to nursery or school about how to keep your child safe – they may not know much about food allergies.
- Finding safe food to eat when you go out, or ordering take away
- Parties and family events where there is food
For many families, there is also the constant worry of an unexpected allergic reaction.
The general public often misunderstands food allergy, and can underestimate how important safety is for a family where a child or young person is allergic.
One strategy for making daily life easier is to keep things simple - stick to the same foods and the same restaurants, and avoid parties/events. But this restricts your family’s choices, and a child growing up like this may find it really difficult to ever try anything new.
A different strategy is to develop good food safety skills, and make them a habit:
- Read labels,
- Tell people about the allergy/allergies,
- Ask about what is in food that doesn’t have a label,
- Plan ahead about parties, restaurant meals or holidays,
- Watch out for cross contamination,
- Always have a safe treat/snack available,
- Double check when other people are offering your child food,
- Avoid anything if you don’t feel confident that it is safe.
If you practise these habits at home, they will become second nature for your children too as they get older, which is important if their allergies do not go away. At an early age, they they may be able to talk about their allergy and can learn to check with an adult before helping themselves to something. As they get older, they can perhaps learn to recognise things that are not safe just from the packaging, and eventually read labels themselves.