Food Allergies... - Inver Grove Heights,MN

I am not an expert in any way but just want to share what i have seen over the past years. I have 3 children and no known allergies. I myself dealt with seasonal allergies and I also suffered with hayfever and asthma as a child. I am blessed to be working with a company in which we help people with allergies by simply introducing optimal nutrition. What I have seen is amazing at how building up the body's immune system by feeding the body what it needs to thrive will avoid so many different diseases including allergies. For the past 4 years my seasonal allergies are not an issue.
My question is always...WHY so many children today have allergies? When I was young, I can not remember knowing another child with any food allergies.
Food for thought!!! ;)

My first child is allergic to peanuts. So while pregnant and nursing my second child, I avoided peanuts. She is allergic to milk and eggs ( I drank a lot of milk, but didn't eat many eggs while pregnant and nursing). Not sure if you want to avoid all allergens for your entire pregnancy and nursing... but I figure that would be the only way for you to do something to prevent the allergies (but knowing that it may not work).

My 2nd daughter has SO many food allergies... my 1st daughter has NONE, and they've both been to the allergist. I did nothing different that I can think of, I think it just varies child to child. One of my girlfriends has 2 kids, her son is not allergic to anything, but her daughter has serious food allergies. The hardest thing for me with one child with allergies and one without is food preparation. Both my girls love peanut butter and jelly, but one has a peanut allergy. They both love salad, but one is allergic to LETTUCE (yes, lettuce.)... In all fairness, I try to make things they can both eat, but sometimes my older daughter gets the things that my other child can't have. I have a 4 month old son and I'm curious to see if he'll be allergic to anything. Also, my daughters allergies didn't develop until she was 4... she grew into them. I am allergic to almonds, ONLY almonds, but my daughter with allergies is not. Funny thing, allergies ;)

I have three children and only our middle child has food allergies. My husband and I both have food allergies as well, so we took every precaution with each of our three daughters. I don't think there is anything you can do to really prevent them, but it is likely that they can outgrow some of the allergies. My middle daughter, who is 2 years old, is allergic to all dairy, eggs, peanuts and tree nuts. It is likely that she could outgrow the dairy and egg allergies by the time she reaches kindergarten with complete avoidance of it. I did breastfeed all my children until they were 12 months old and did nothing different for any of them.

Good luck!
A.

I have 2 boys and only one of the them has a peanut allergy. My husband and I have no allergies, by my brother-in-law also has a peanut allergy. It's really unknown whether or not things you eat while pregnant will have an influence on allergies. I did eat lots of peanut butter when I was pregnant. You can try not eating any peanuts yourself while pregnant or breastfeeding.

I waited until 4 months to introduce solids.

I have 3 kids and the first one doesn't even have hay fever but the younger two have asthma. My daughter who is in the middle has hay fever and no food allergies, my youngest has food allergies and no hay fever. I always blamed his food allergies on his chicken pox since he was only 10 months when he got that and the allergies showed up right after that. He tested allergies to peanuts, nuts, wheat, milk, beans, corn, chocolate and bananas. He outgrew a lot of the allergies but he doesn't eat peanuts, nuts, chocolate or bananas since it sometimes bothers his asthma. One thing I was surprised at was the fact that he got chicken pox since I was nursing him at the time and thought he was covered by that. I also didn't start him on solids until he was 6 months old like they claim will help ward off food allergies and yet he was the only one with them. My two older children I started on ceral at a month old making it pretty runny and by 3 months old they were eating fruits and vegetables. It just goes to show you that you can't predict anything when it comes to the gene pool.

Each child is different, each may have some similar issues but even if your 2nd child has allergies..you are on top of that now and soon enough just taking care of your 1st allergies all of this will become normal.
My son is allergic to peanuts, dog silvia and some seafood's, so we do not feed him PB, he is older now and knows which candy he cannot eat etc.
With the milk allergies she could out grow them, but this is the time to be around for these issues as there is so much help out there..soy milk is available everywhere and you can cook with it too. Depending on how severe her PB allergies are you will have to be in charge when she is older on letting people know. it is almost easier for the 1st child to have issues as it makes the 2nd one seem so much easier :-) But you cannot predict what each child is born with, I ate PB all while pregnant..you just do not know if 2 uncles back had allergies...but like I said if your 2nd or 3rd have allergies you know what to do and it is easier then with already having gone through it. Good Luck,

S.-

My response is more from the scientific side of things based upon your question.

The science behind food allergies isn't clearly understood at this point in time - evidenced by the American Academy of Pediatric's recent decision to change their policies on when to introduce foods to children. Currently, they're not recommending delaying the introduction of solids - the current belief is that delaying certain foods may actually INCREASE the chance of developing an allergy. So, unless the food is a known family allergen or poses a choking hazard, there are no limits on when to give babies certain foods.

While there are some food allergies that can be genetically linked, there are many families in which only 1 of many children is affected. Additionally, some children are known to outgrow allergies.

Have you spoken with a Pediatric allergist to better understand the probability of having another child with the same issues? How often the child outgrows these specific allergies, etc?

In a quick Google search just now, there's a lot of old, outdated information online. I'd be very careful regarding what sources you read and would recommend verifying information with the pediatrician/allergist to confirm if it fits into current medical policy regarding food allergies.

Here's what the American Academy of Pediatrics says, but I couldn't find anything really helpful while glancing through it quickly:
http://www.healthychildren.org/english/search/pages/resul...

Here's some quick information from Mayo Clinic as well:
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/food-allergy/DS00082/DSE...

My first had a dairy sensitivity and shellfish allergy, (I had the dairy sensitivity, too and my husband has a shellfish allergy). However, my second didn't have the dairy and we've decided not to test the shellfish yet (we're vegetarian, so she wouldn't be exposed to it any time soon).

I have 4 kids...9, 6, 2 & almost 6 months. So far (since the baby is still starting on solids and hasn't been exposed to much), the only one with allergies is the 2 year old. She has a severe peanut allergy...however, that is her only allergy. The docs were actually amazed that it was her only sensitivity since it is so high. I asked if there was a way to determine if the baby would be allergic as well. They told me that we could start blood testing at age 1 (and then annually after that) to see if he has any reactions. I don't want to chance it since we found the peanut allergy so horrifically (read: eating cookie...anaphylaxis...ER visit). They told me that when there is a family history (parent, grandparent or sibling) with an allergy, it is more likely to show up.

Basically you're looking at random chance unless you have extended family with food allergies, at which point the chances are much higher.

On the other hand, you now know how to handle it, and are going to need to alter your cooking for the other child indefinitely, anyway, so one more with the problem shouldn't be THAT severe a problem when compared to the joys of little people.

I will say that for a lot of people, allergies are their immune systems way of expressing that it is surviving in overdrive. The more it has to react to environmental irritants and viruses and bacteria and intestinal malabsorption, the more likely it is to also react to anything and everything around that isn't just one of those things. This is basically a malfunction of the system's capacity to adapt to the low loads of a desert environment or the much deadlier immune loads of living in a swamp.

This leads to two schools of thought. One is the school of introducing something legitimate for the body to fight continuously. There is a guy who has been able to get kids out of bubbles through introducing a benign parasite to their systems to give their system something legitimate to focus on.

The other option is to try to eliminate gut damage, environmental toxins like most cleaners other than vinegar and baking soda, and most pesticides, artificial colors and preservatives, etc, and any sources of molds and other irritants from their lives to better enable their system to calm down and settle in.