Child with peanut allergy and MIL

[Freshflower]

So my child has a nut allergy and is prescribed with an epipen. Dc had a serious reaction as a small baby and since then nothing. Obviously I avoid anything containing nuts and do not go anywhere near 'not suitable for nut allergy sufferers ', etc on food packaging. I believe this ensures full safety and I bring up my child with this view too. Im very meticulous when it comes to this.I understand that people do consume ' may contain ' , with no issues . My MIL will not listen to this and continually gives dc foods with these labels , saying its fine or she said "if there is a trace of anything it won't cause any serious reaction because its only a trace'. I repeat and constantly tell her to stop but she carries on and will send dc back home with these foods. Shes done it recently and then messaged if child enjoyed the chocolate , like she knows and taking the mickey ,she is controlling in other ways too and I feel she just doesn't like being told. I trust that she would not give anything with actual nuts but her not listening to my simple request to avoid these food labels of may contain, I find could potentially be dangerous and down right disrespectful. Do you think what she's doing is OK? Maybe I'm going OTT? Thanks

This is a safeguarding issue.

She wouldn’t be seeing my child again. She could kill him.

You need to sort this with DH and then agree next steps with MIL.

You are not overreacting. Your DH needs to understand the risk to your DC and ensures the DC is protected from his DMs lack of understanding.

I had my niece for the day. Older than yours. She inadvertently ate some cake with peanut butter. She is amazingly thorough herself around nuts but was caught out there. She had no pen in those days. Her lips began to swell. My heart went into my mouth. Was heading for the hospital but gave her an antihistamine first and slowly she recovered. Has a pen now.
After that incident l would say never, ever mess with allergies. Your mil is playing with fire and is being very negligent

She has shown she can't be trusted to keep your child safe, nor to respect your decisions as parents. I wouldn't be allowing her unsupervised access to my child - aside from the may contains, I wouldn't trust her to read the actual ingredients carefully enough.

Our DD is allergic to peanuts and has epipens, we do allow may contains in agreement with her specialists, but that's our decision to take as parents until she's old enough to choose herself. No one else gets to make that decision.

Some people find it useful to refer to may contains as "may contain poison" which is a reasoning you could use with your MIL (as you will know it doesn't matter if she doesn't react once, because there was likely no peanut present, but the next packet may be different due to a missed spot when cleaning etc). But I wouldn't trust her.

GPs don't usually do the first prescription, it's usually a specialist, based on a number of factors including the allergen, previous reactions and other conditions. Our DD has epipens following one non-anaphylactic reaction to peanuts because her history of viral wheeze increases the risk.

My son has a specific nut allergy and its quite an unusual nut so we do eat 'may contain nuts' but not 'may contain specific nut'

However my take of caution is my son had a bar of chocolate that said "produced in a factory that' and there was a whole nut in it. Not a trace. A whole nut. Luckily not the one he is allergic to and he spotted it.

So I would be livid if someone decided to follow thier own rules not mine..

My lovely MIL was brilliant at feeding both our probably-allergic children correctly, but allergies ran in her family so she knew the risks. In this case, your MIL is almost certainly showing you that 'she knows best', and that you are making an unnecessary fuss. You can't trust her to have DC on his own.

MIL is reckless obnoxious woman.

I would bring her to doctor with me to get an expert to explain why she is no longer caring for my child.

I’ve had similar non-believer … the “allergies” did not exist when you were a baby (yeah, because they all died before epi-pen!!)

Also had family member not believe in medicine, I learned the hard way. SIL was looking after son when I first returned to work, son had ear infection but crazy SIL did not administer medicine. But told me, yes he took it just fine.
Caught her out because the syringe was in my dressing gown pocket (and not medicine box) which I discovered before evening dose . Innocently asked SIL next morning how she gave medicine & she made up a special spoon, I asked her which one, what color (syringe was required to get it from special bottle). She would have had to break a special top to use a spoon.
Then she said she put olive oil (not even pharmacy oil) in his ear and gave him honey (not allowed for 6 mos old) because of its healing properties. I had to delay return to work. Some people are just effed up. She was not even remotely sorry, years later raised own child imo very carelessly. For example, chocolate milk in bedtime bottle so her child loves her more.

She put unsterile cooking oil in his ear … to clear an infection. GP then also prescribed ear drops to get at the cooking oil. BTW I was paying her.

Take that MIL to a doctor,

I'm so angry for you! What kind of grandmother puts their grandchild at risk like that?!

Have you said "do you not remember that DC nearly died from a nut allergy when he was a baby?? I know those labels don't say they definitely contain nuts, but they contain a possibility that they may have been contaminated with nuts. How would you feel if he had a reaction in your care? What if he died in your care??"

No way she'd be looking after my child again if she didn't agree to change her ways.

(Do see if you can get up to date allergy testing though as some people do grow out of it. Also, sometimes the allergy can be trained out of you, but it has to be done with medical supervision and assistance, not MIL just handing him a packet of chocolate buttons!)

When my son had a best friend with a nut allergy we were asked to make sure that our house was free from any "may contain traces" foods, not eat out for 24 hours before visiting his house and shower and brush our teeth before visiting. Some people don't have any idea how severe allergies can be.

Can't believe the pure ignorance and selfish stupid behaviour of mil. She would never have unsupervised access to my child again.

Wow. I have a kid with an allergy and I don't know that I'd go along with all that!

This!!!!

You’re absolutely not being OTT. She is being an unbelievably reckless, nasty arsehole. What is it with so many grandparents refusing to cater children’s allergies? Why do they seem to think it’s pandering? Do they not realise then seriousness?

My daughter, who used to be allergic to milk, would react in contact to people who had consumed it - trying to get the grandparents not to hold her/kiss her after drinking tea was so hard!

There is a horrible true story on Reddit of a mother who sadly, lost her daughter due to a grandparent like this. One who thought she new better. It’s a truly harrowing account. Perhaps she should read it!

What the first op said

It's too risky

In order to be right your MIL is prepared to risk the health of your DC. I cannot imagine how any caring Grandparent would do this.

Even if I was convinced that my DS/DIL or DD were being over protective I would follow their rules absolutely. Unfortunately nut allergy is serious and can be deadly so there is no way anyone should be taking chances with that.

That would be zero unsupervised contact with MIL for me then.

The urge to break rules / behave in risky ways for a certain personality type (controlling/ narcissistic)!seems to be irresistible for them. They cannot abide being told what to do, and will do the opposite as a response.

I know a dad with this personality type who was asked nicely by his ex not to give ibuprofen to son with chickenpox on a contact visit. What did he do within minutes of child arriving at his house? You’ve guessed it.

Also refuses to give any meds properly or at all. Zero medical training but reckons he knows better than GP. It’s infuriating.

Whenever I hear of this, I think of this case. Before that Christmas they'd been NC and I don’t think that it was by mistake that the first thing the Mother said was "what did you do to the food?" to her Father, the cook. MIL can't be left alone with your child.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/boy-12-died-after-eating-25189839.amp

I agree your child can't be unsupervised- she is not to be trusted at all.

It sounds harsh but your job as a parent is to protect your child. That means not leaving them alone with someone who knowingly and willingly puts their health at risk.

I know it's hard to put your foot down at times, but your child's health is more important than anyone's feelings and no amount of potential upset/conflict is worth risking them becoming unwell.

She must be related to my mother!. She gave my 2 year old penicillin she had lying around after being told she was allergic. My daughter was blue lighted to hospital. Fecking unbelievable behaviour. She came out with all her tosh, doctors etc were over reacting etc.

As you know, this doesn’t prove that your child has been exposed to traces and been fine, she may have just got lucky that those didn’t have traces in them. Until the time when one does have a trace in it.

Just to counter some of the other posts, my son has epipens for multiple food allergies and his specialist recommends not avoiding may contain foods (so we don't).

Are you under the allergy department? We have annual reviews and he's retested every year to see if he has outgrown

My older child also had multiple allergies but happily outgrew them (they tested in he hospital under controlled conditions)

I would be asking her why she would take the risk.

I asked my own MIL this when I asked her if she’d checked if the cinnamon donuts she’d given DS were fried in peanut oil, and she said no there was no need because she “assumed” the high heat meant “nothing remained of the peanuts”. I asked if she really did assume this, or if she knew. She repeated, “assumed”. I just watched her face, in silence, as I let that sink in. THEN I pointed out she was in the country, 40 mins from the nearest hospital with only one epipen (15 mins of adrenaline). THEN I asked her to please explain why she took the risk and what her thought process was. I was probably (definitely) a bit vicious. But it got through (because not being vicious didn’t).