My anxiety around children's food allergies

[BlossomCloud]

I've developed really bad anxiety around my children's food allergies, particularly in relation to eating out. (They are allergic to milk and egg)

ds started nursery a month after his first big allergic reaction so I guess I'd always been used to accepting other people were responsible for some meals, and that really helped (they were an amazing nursery in terms of how they catered for him too).

Pre pandemic we ate out reasonably regularly. I never totally loved it , was very careful where we went etc and always on edge a bit.

But we stopped in the pandemic as I didn't like the idea of taking any risks in a system under strain

But now , I guess because we totally stopped for a bit, my anxiety is crippling me. The last couple of times we've eaten out I have barely managed a mouthful of food. But they really want to eat out, and look forward to it.

Has anyone else experienced this and what did you do?

(I'm not an anxious parent in other respects, I cheerily wave them off to do adventure sports etc- they've been sailing all day today!)

Life as an allergy parent is so hard. But as said above the online allergy community is really supportive. My youngest (milk, eggs, peanuts and sesame) has real anxiety over food - she had some sessions at the hospital to focus on this and they really helped. It was taking small steps - just sit in a new restaurant with a safe drink the first time etc. it did help but we generally stick to chains - we often have mishaps if we try anywhere else! Check out allergy hour on Twitter, allergy companions for restaurant recommendations and my site Lucy's Friendly Foods for recommendations and recipes (also on fb and instagram) - I try and write about coping on holidays and eating out too. Hope that helps!

Have you ever heard of allergy companions? Worth a look?

https://www.allergycompanions.com/

Thank you both!

@lucysfriendlyfoods I have followed you on Facebook for ages your recipes are amazing! I am a terrible cook anyway and cooking without milk or egg terrified me so finding your recipes was a godsend. I also read your blogs on travel in France when I was getting very anxious about going to France earlier this year .

@JuneOsborne allergy companions looks like just what I need. My anxiety had been absolutely awful this week but I don't want to stop my children experiencing normal parts of life either. Feeling like I can research places to go sounds really helpful

Oh brilliant 🤩 I'm so happy my recipes and website are useful. Tbh I don't think the anxiety gets much easier - we tried to be confident and brave last week and bought some pasta from a deli that we were assured was safe - both DDs (both allergic to milk) had a reaction- so now we're back at not really trusting new places! Do be aware with allergy companions- whilst Lily who runs it is lovely and the websites is super helpful we've noticed reviews we've put in saying good for our allergies have been changed to include other allergies that we didn't check about. So it's worth doing your own investigations too x

Yes that's a fair point about allergy companions. My thinking is it's more a starting point for our own research, as obviously staff etc can change as well.

We're at center parcs are the moment and I can see that a few years ago people were giving them glowing reviews for allergies on various sites and then in the pandemic they've had a complete policy change and are now basically making it clear they won't make any effort to be allergy safe. Thankfully the children have been fab about it (2 have allergies, 2 dont) but it feels rubbish to see somewhere "family friendly" basically being hostile towards people with allergies.

Ugh I hear you. I have a child with 10 allergies (that we currently know of) and it hangs heavy at the back of my mind all the time.

He has the obvious egg/dairy/nuts allergies that are fairly easy to avoid but he has extra sneaky allergies too which can cause problems. We were recently at centre parcs and he couldn't eat a single chip in the whole place because all the restaurants use the same chips which have pea flour in them. That was a real worry becasue chips have always been our fall back and what felt like a safe food to allow him to eat something at the table until we could get home and feed him if we were struggling when out.

But also I've even started to get anxious about me eating food incase I have an allergic reaction despite never having done so in all my years. I'm sorry, I've no tips or reassurance just wanted to say I hear you and I get it.

So what's happening here is the part of your subconscious mind responsible for protecting your children from their allergies has gone into overdrive and is producing a massive anxiety response in order to keep them safe - so it's doing it for the right reason but it's kiboshing everything in the process. It's a similar response to someone who's been in a car crash and subsequently is unable to drive or maybe even get into a car.

If you, the conscious, rational you is confident that you are able to manage the practical side of it then one or two sessions of remedial hypnosis would be sufficient to tell that part of your mind that it's OK, you are in control and it can dial down the anxiety.

That's exactly it @Eyesopenwideawake ... My brain needs to be vigilant, but not paralysingly vigilant to the point I am awake all night feeling like an elephant is sitting on my lungs!

I think what has kick started the anxiety anew is that I now have an autoimmune condition that affects my neuromuscular junctions, meaning if I get stressed my muscles stop working (including my speech muscles and legs), and I am so afraid my body would let me down in a crisis. I am going to try and talk to my specialist nurse about this as well, I think having a plan would help

OK, so it's even more important that you are in control. To understand what's going on imagine your mind as a ship with a captain (your conscious mind) and a crew (the subconscious).

The captain is in charge and can make decisions about where the ship's going and how it's going to get there, but is limited in terms of only being able to concentrate on a handful of tasks at any given point in time. The crew are in charge of everything else - all your automatic actions and thoughts, your memories, emotions, creativity, etc. Each crew member has a particular role so, in your case, one is responsible for your children's allergies and now one has taken on the task of telling you to be aware of your autoimmune condition. It could be the first crew member is triggering the second to be exceptionally careful to avoid any danger and is sending out extra anxiety alarm signals to be really, really careful.

Does this make sense??

It makes total sense @Eyesopenwideawake I think that's exactly whats happening.
Particularly as my anxiety is so specific, I have cheerily watched them go bouldering, kayaking and sailing over the last few weeks! And , as I keep telling myself, I happily drive them places (previously, thanks to an awful bereavement, I used to be so afraid of cars I wouldn't even get in one as a passenger let alone learn to drive!)!

I just wanted to say I hear you, and I have stood in your shoes.my son was allergic to a whole host of things that he thankfully grew out of, all except for milk proteins which he is anaphylactic to. I just wanted to give you a virtual hug and tell you that it's all going to work out, take the small steps, go to the one or two places that you feel safe, and that your children can feel safe and confident to order and explain their allergies. We have to empower our children to be able to live in this world. My son is now 19 years old and this year travelled abroad by himself for two weeks. Of course I was a nervous wreck for much of the time, but I was so proud that he was able to navigate travelling by aeroplane, buses, trains etc all with no problem, carrying his medications and EpiPen every step of the way.

Good! Happy to send you a list of remedial hypnosis practitioners who would be able to help you - simply by connecting with those specific crew members and asking them, nicely, to tone it down a bit!

I am dreading that stage @zoopigi but I know he is so keen to see the world! And it did give me confidence that he has , unprompted, been training his friends what to do if he has anaphylaxis (he has just started secondary).

@Eyesopenwideawake yes please I am interested, I know the anxiety will be worsening my automimmune condition

I'm going to use another angle here OP. I work in hospitality. Restaurants for the past six or seven years. We have parents come in, who's children have allergies who seemingly pass the responsibility completely over to us. Now I have extensive allergen training however there is always the 'we cannot guarantee anything is 100% safe and we are not allowed to check labels' it states this on the allergy tablet. But there are still some that expect us to bend the rules so they can order something that might not be on the safe list. Whilst your crippling anxiety must be awful and I really feel for you, I expect that you are the kind of parent who would take your own food somewhere to ensure your child's safety. And we applaud these parents. It must be utterly utterly shit for your kids to have such allergies, but I wouldn't put my kids life so haphazardly in that of a stranger and it makes me anxious when they do. But rest assured that food allergies are taken very seriously and we as staff really do care about your children 🩵

Hi OP. I have just stumbled across your post whilst obsessively researching potential places to eat out in London for a trip we have booked this weekend....

My DC is allergic to milk and fish. He had an extremely severe allergic reaction to milk about a year ago which was extremely traumatic. I don't particularly enjoy eating out with him because I have to tolerate a pretty uncomfortable level of anxiety. But I know that I need to tolerate this in order for him to enjoy normal life - I try really hard to impress on him how seriously we need to take his allergies without frightening him... it's an impossibly tricky balance.

I am a mental health professional so I am very aware that some of my anxiety is rational, and some not so much... I've been lucky enough to access some therapy through work (a bit of a mix of EMDR and trauma focused CBT) and this has really helped to gain some perspective and try to hold a more balanced view.

No answers here...but solidarity!

Thanks @girlfrombackthen you are right, it's an impossibly tricky balance ! It definitely helps to hear from others and feel less alone