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Forum -> Children's Health -> Allergies
Help me understand this please



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amother
Blue


 

Post Wed, Aug 15 2018, 12:06 pm
I'm confused. Schools and camps send home letters with dire warnings regarding the importance of not bringing anything with even a trace of peanuts to school or camp. There are boys and girls that would be in significant danger if exposed to peanuts. What I don't get is what happens outside school/camp. Do these kids go to shul, the playground, an amusement park, walk in the street, or go anywhere around people? I never hear about this except school and camp. What do these kids do the rest of the time.
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mha3484




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Aug 15 2018, 12:16 pm
There are nut free shuls in my community if the shul members so desire. Many many years ago I davened in a minyan that rented space from another shul. We had our kiddush and then they had theirs. A child of that shul had severe nut allergies and someone in our minyan put nuts in an aufruf bag without thinking. I think the allergic child ate or touched the nuts and became extremely sick. The next shabbos our rav went ballistic. Yelled at the whole shul for being irresponsible. It was prob around 10 years ago and it made such an impression on me.

I am going to assume in an outdoor place like the park or an amusement park the air circulates which reduces some risk. But indoors its much harder. Also technically no one has to go to an amusement park but they do have to go to school.
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amother
Firebrick


 

Post Wed, Aug 15 2018, 12:25 pm
When kids go to shul, amusement parks, on the street, the parents can be on top of what their kids are eating. In school, it's the schools responsibility. So it only makes sense for them to go peanut free.
In my times, schools where not peanut free, it's only in recent years.
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NovelConcept




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Aug 15 2018, 12:36 pm
I have a daughter with a peanut allergy. I am so thankful the school went peanut-free to accommodate her. Thankfully, it isn't so severe that she can be in the room with it. She just can't touch or eat it. Many kids can't even be in the room with it. I even know of one girl that goes in to anaphylactic shock when she enters a building that had even a trace of nuts since the last deep cleaning. I heard they recently got her a dog that goes into building to sniff it out before she enters.

It's scary. It's really, really scary. My daughter isn't allowed to eat anything when go to a simcha unless she asks me first. And even then, there is a slight element of risk. I wish people would totally go nut-free for all simchos. I think it is wrong and dangerous.

Don't get me wrong; we've got a whole lot of other allergies too, but nuts are just the worst of the worst and NOBODY MISSES THEM if they are not in a cake for a simcha. Just do without, please.
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amother
Lime


 

Post Wed, Aug 15 2018, 12:36 pm
Parents of children with life threatening allergies can watch their young children. It's easier for the camp or school to make a blanket rule than to guard those few children carefully every day.
I cringe in the grocery store when I see a 2 year old munching on bamba while sitting in the front of a shopping cart then leaving the handlebar full of peanut crumbsfor the next child... but all we can do is try our best.
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anonymrs




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Aug 15 2018, 8:32 pm
amother wrote:
Parents of children with life threatening allergies can watch their young children. It's easier for the camp or school to make a blanket rule than to guard those few children carefully every day.
I cringe in the grocery store when I see a 2 year old munching on bamba while sitting in the front of a shopping cart then leaving the handlebar full of peanut crumbsfor the next child... but all we can do is try our best.


If you’re kid is that allergic, you keep wipes in your bag and wipe down the shopping cart before putting your kid in. I know I do.
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seeker




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Aug 15 2018, 10:18 pm
amother wrote:
When kids go to shul, amusement parks, on the street, the parents can be on top of what their kids are eating. In school, it's the schools responsibility. So it only makes sense for them to go peanut free.
In my times, schools where not peanut free, it's only in recent years.

This.
Also, my kids aren't eating any stranger's food on the street, or shaking their hands etc. In school there's a LOT of interaction. Kid has that nutella dip stuff for snack, it gets on their fingers, then from there to the doorknob, desk, books, who knows... and if those traces wind up on my kid's food/hands/mouth it could be serious. Kids share snacks, as much as you warn them or watch them when you have an average class of 20+ kids and the one with allergies may be at a reckless age... it's just so much better safe than sorry. Especially since nuts are relatively easy to avoid. I work in a camp that is nut-free where there are nut-allergic kids and the issues are always chocolate (or those awful nutella dips...) Whenever I have to take one away from a kid, I feel like screaming at the parent - your kid's CHOCOLATE is more important than another kid's LIFE? The ones I really feel bad for are the severe dairy allergies. There is just no way to ban all dairy so school and camp must be terrifying. Dairy is one of those allergies that can be extreme, and dairy is everywhere especially where there are kids involved.
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amother
Red


 

Post Thu, Aug 16 2018, 1:50 am
DD has airborne anaphylactic allergies to eggs and milk. She wears a mask whenever we go out (which is rarely) and is currently home schooled. We dont go to shul. We dont go to the park. We dont go to the mall. We hope to transition her to a typical school setting when she gets a bit older but we understand that we may not be able to. The nut allergic kids might be doing the same thing. Don't be so quick to judge.
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NovelConcept




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, Aug 16 2018, 2:03 am
amother wrote:
DD has airborne anaphylactic allergies to eggs and milk. She wears a mask whenever we go out (which is rarely) and is currently home schooled. We dont go to shul. We dont go to the park. We dont go to the mall. We hope to transition her to a typical school setting when she gets a bit older but we understand that we may not be able to. The nut allergic kids might be doing the same thing. Don't be so quick to judge.


I also have a severe dairy allergy that causes me to go in anaphylaxis when there is dairy in the air. But it has to be either a lot of cold dairy, or even a little hot.

Could it be that she can tolerate being around cold, and not hot, allergens? In general, heat causes the allergens to spread in the air, but cold, not so much.

It is so sad that she has to wear a mask. If she is okay around cold, that would give you some freedom.

While dairy is a scary allergy when it comes to schooling, I think egg or wheat must be the hardest of all. BH I've never had to deal with those two. It is so tough.

Even with dairy, there's been mistakes. My daughter's principal almost killed her with stupidity. A teacher forgot about her allergy and gave her a milk chocolate, and then remembered a minute later and told my daughter not to eat. So she, being terrified of allergic reactions, threw it right away. A while later the principal passed by and said she saw my daughter overreacting because she "imagined" she was having an allergic reaction. Her face was all puffy and she said her tongue itched...

I found out two weeks later, at PTA, when the principal mentioned it in passing to show me how much my daughter exaggerates. She does, I admit it. But the child has never had an allergic reaction save for once, when she was a baby. She has NO IDEA that a tongue should itch... And her face was swollen!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I was furious. If someone doesn't know how dangerous allergies are, they just don't get it.
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FranticFrummie




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, Aug 16 2018, 5:33 am
I have no idea how peanut allergic kids survive in Israel.

Most children here seem to BATHE in Bamba dust. Schools make a halfhearted comment about not bringing nuts at the beginning of the year, and then never enforce it.

On the other hand, Israel has some of the lowest nut allergy rates in the world, because of the above mentioned ubiquitous Bamba dust. Babies are exposed to it very early on.

DD is HIGHLY allergic to eggplant. That's one that no one ever thinks about. It's an odd allergy to have. Eggplant is a huge part of the Israeli diet, so it's difficult for her to avoid when we go out. Lately she's been able to tolerate being in the same room with a dish of cold eggplant, but she still can't be anywhere near it when it's warm or hot.
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amother
Turquoise


 

Post Mon, Aug 20 2018, 5:32 pm
I have an anaphylactic nut allergy, since I was little. There are so many things that that are complicated about the outside world.

It is harder for me to manage as an adult in some ways. If you are a kid, there are nut free schools, but my workplace isn't nut free at all - and though everyone at work knows about my allergies, my immediate room has nuts banned (by me), but since there are nuts in the office (granola bars, cookies, cakes, nutella, hazelnut coffee, etc.), there are mistakes, which require spending my workday to deep clean things because of carelessness. I have to keep gloves in bag at all times in case I need to clean something. Also, any time I want to go to a social event, I have an issue - the local shiur has cookies served, my friends are having an outing at a restaurant, some kind of lecture that has a buffet. I have been living in my neighborhood for many years and have basically no friends because it is too hard for me to be at social events, sometimes even being at the park is complicated. Even for my husband and I to go on a date - the person sitting in front me at a show is eating something with nuts, and I have to go hide standing in the back for hours alone away from the food and leaving my husband alone. Or when I go on a bus, and have to move to stand in the aisle in the back because someone near me pulls out a granola bar or even get off and wait for the next bus.

But the hardest part for me is having allergies as a parent - kids are messy eaters and if they eat something with nuts, trace crumbs are usually all over them (ever watch a kid eat a cookie, and wipe their hands on their pants halfway through, or brush the hair out of their eyes in the middle, etc.). Like I go pick up my child from school (a school with no allergy restrictions) and they runs up to me covered in chocolate something or other which might have nuts and I have to shout at my own child not to touch me before they stick their nutty little hands all over my face. Or they want to go to a show or an attraction or someplace fun and I usually can't take them because of other kids there with nuts, and they miss out on so many things they want to go to and can't go anywhere fun and also miss out on fun bonding experiences outside our living room. Or we are out somewhere and some random kid runs by sprinkling granola bar crumbs and we spend the rest of our outing with me scrubbing myself off in a public bathroom. Or one of my kids makes some amazing cake or cookies for shabbos in camp or school and brings it home so proud of it and I can't even have it in the house and we have to throw it out because of me and they are so disappointed. Or my child comes home from a friend where they ate something with nuts and instead of just being normal I make them go straight in the bathtub every single time even if it is 3 in the afternoon, even if they are hungry and want a snack or are tired and want a nap, that all has to wait. Or if they want to help me bake for shabbos but I can't let them touch any food being prepared because I have no idea what crumbs they were exposed to during the day which might still be under their fingernails or in their hair or on their shirts, or letting them help me and not being able to eat the food we made at all. Or I take them to the park and 3 minutes after we get there I have to force them all to go home crying because some random kid bumped into me with a wafer, and then they continue crying at hoem while I ignore them so I can shower to get off all the crumbs. Making my kids crazy because I have an allergy makes me feel so guilty, and even worse is me being afraid of going near my own kids is for sure the worst part about having an anaphylactic allergy as a parent.
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SpottedBanana




 
 
    
 

Post Mon, Aug 20 2018, 9:56 pm
Anaphylactic to nuts here as well. I always bring Benadryl and epipen everywhere now, and my mother always carried them with her for family trips, made sure I had them at shul, etc, but when I was a kid at school I used to lose everything and had some reactions. One time I was on a school trip on the bus and the school gave out danishes with cashews. Being the ADD kid I was I didn't check the ingredients very thoroughly. If a teacher didn't happen to have Benadryl on her I could have actually died R'L since I didn't have my meds on me. (I still had to go to the hospital that day and go on prednisone from having eaten so much nut) So I understand that schools cannot prevent my story from happening to kids with any allergen, but peanuts are such a common one (common as in it is common for kids to be airborne allergic and common as in it is common as a snack item, unlike other top allergens eg fish) that it makes sense to me as a balance between the needs of the few and the many to at least ban that one.

For moms of children with anaphylactic-just-for-airborne egg, milk, or wheat allergies who *don't* homeschool, I honestly don't know how your kids are alive.
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