Allergic to everything he finds comfort in.

[WineIsTheAnswer]

DS is 3 and autistic, has a severe mixed language disorder. He spends his days with our elderly dog, outside alone. Eating bread sticks, biscuits and drinking milk.

His allergy results are in, high (grade 4 and above). Dog, Cat, Grass pollen, house dust mite, wheat, milk, peanuts, pistachios, egg. Everything he finds comfort in, he's allergic to. I could cry.

He knows if I change the brand of food he has, let alone the ingredients. I can't keep the dog away from him, it's the only thing he doesn't get angry with. I don't know where to go from here, the allergies are making his eczema so bad but I can't take away the only things that make sense to him in this world.

I have an appointment with a dietitian next month but I can't see how they can help him, his diets rubbish as it is, we can't start taking things away. Allergy specialist has arranged to speak with his community paed to decide where to go from here. I just can't see anything to make this better for him.

[MairOldAlibi]

The dog is probably worth it. Grass pollen- half the country is allergic to that, can't avoid, so no point in worrying about it too much.

With diet- lots of people with allergic dc who had ASD say their dc sometimes get sort of addicted to the allergy-causing foods, and that after the initial disaster of withdrawing it (preferably with dietician support obviously) is over, things improve

[VioletBumble]

I'd agree with just focusing on the stuff that he's actually ingesting as that might make a real difference to his health eventually. The gut and its associated allergies / dysfunction is implicated in neurological issues so it's worth exploring if the tests are showing that he has a definite allergy. Good luck, it's hard but with the right support from dietitian it can hopefully be a real positive once the change is made.

[youarekiddingme]

Yeah totally agree with the number/grade not relating to reaction.

DS has a negliable reaction to tomato in RAST, yet anaphylactic reaction to digestion. (He's out grown it now).

If you do have to make changes I'd do it gradually. So if introducing a new milk if he usually has 100ml put 90ml milk and 10ml allergen free milk in. Keep adjusting the amounts so that DS gets use to the change gradually.
Same with breadsticks, say 2 in a bowl, ones GF and ones 'normal'. No fuss and if possible without him noticing!

With airborne allergens a daily dose of cetirizine or loratidine should manage those. They tend to be worse when other allergens are thrown in because the total allergic markers in the body is higher.


It's great that your getting a multi disaplinary approach to this.