How did you know? – This is the question we hear all the time.  How did you find out that your daughter had nut allergies?  Well…we did a due diligence in serving our kids nuts and peanut butter at all the recommended ages.  On a car ride to Milwaukee from Madison, our daughter started telling us how dry her mouth felt, and how her lips felt funny. When i turned around from the passenger seat (5 months pregnant) I saw what we describe it as “Donald Duck Lips” and that is when we knew we needed a hospital.
If you’re driving eastbound on I-94, you know there is not much to look at. Much less a hospital. We had her sing the ABC song to monitor her breathing, etc. We had a decision to make. Either pull over an call 911, or drive faster to Oconomowoc where a new hospital was directly off the interstate.  We picked drive faster. We made it to the hospital in a very short time, thanks to my husbands excellent driving. As soon as we got in, ER staff took excellent, excellent care of her. Her symptoms subsided and we hung out at the hospital for a while, then went to Milwaukee to enjoy the rest of our weekend. Hospital staff told us to follow up with our primary, who then sent us to see a specialist.
It’s been about 3 years since we received the diagnosis from our pediatric allergist that our daughter, now 5, had nut allergies. At the time, we thought, “Hrm, stay away from the nuts that she was allergic to….easy enough?”
As we became more aware of nut allergies, we realized how significant of a diagnosis this actually was. Nuts, and the manufacturing facilities that they are in, are everywhere!  Dried fruit, not safe. Nuts that we’re not allergic to, not safe. Most baked items, not safe. M+Ms (my all time favorite chocolates), not safe. Pre-packaged cooking mixes, not safe. Many of our every day items were deemed “Not Safe” in our home anymore.
Finally, we did a nut-detox. Everything in our home that was either a nut, or manufactured in a facility with nuts was tossed out. Officially, we became the nut-free household. So here we are (with my one stash of Skippy, way UP HIGH, because I just can’t kick my PB+J sammies.)
On a daily basis, we receive all sorts of questions on safe snacks, foods at lunch, pot-lucks, questions on things that our daughter can or cannot eat. I welcome any and all questions – actually, I LOVE the questions. It means that you care so much about our daughter that you want to keep her as safe as possible. THANK YOU!
This blog is to share information, recipes, ideas, travel tips (being 35,000 feet up were there is peanut dust in the air gives me goosebumps! EPI PEN!!), safe snacks, fast snacks, pre-packaged snacks, best soy-nut butter, best chocolates, best chocolate that looks like M+Ms! I’ve got loads of stuff to share – and I’m happy to have a place to put it all!
Thanks for stopping by!