I have never appreciate the US Food & Drug Administration (FDA) requiring all ingredients to be listed on food products more than when we discovered this week that Ryan may have several food allergies.We scheduled his appointment in December after yet another round with runny nose, sinus issues, and a cough. The Allergist books 4-6 weeks out, so Tuesday was the earliest available.
Ryan was a trooper. They did the "scratch test" on his back for food allergies (because I thought they would be the easiest to solve once we knew what the allergies were). It wasn't painful for him. They just barely poke him with possible allergyns. And then you wait.
The results came back positive for corn, cow's milk, chocolate, and beef.
That's when the allergist said that there isn't always a direct connection between a food allergy and his symptoms and there are sometimes false positives. "Great!" I thought. But off we went with instructions to eliminate those items from his diet for a week to see if he gets any better.
Of course, he forgot to mention that corn is in EVERYTHING. And if corn isn't, milk is! Don't believe me? Go to your cupboard and find a mulit-ingredient item that doesn't have corn, corn syrup, cornmeal, gluclose, dextrose, or milk. I dare you! Let me know what you find!
4 comments:
ouch, that is a tough blow. Poor kid might have to live on veggies. If I found out I was allergic to milk, I would probably die! Lets hope its something else...like lima beans and liver :)
I unfortunately knew this because I have a good friend who has a corn allergy as well. She actually found a company from somewhere in Europe that sends her food (since they use cane sugar and not corn syrup) but her diet is incredibly limited. If you haven't seen the documentary King Corn now is a good time. Also, if you know any Mexican grocery stores, etc you can find food without corn.
Ah! You poor thing, corn is a difficult allergy! There are some online specialty places where you could order a few things and maybe that would help. Hope he LOVES veggies and fruit;) Maybe once you eliminate them for a week.....and then add a few things back in.....corn will be the one that was "false". Milk is much easier to deal with b/c of so many lactose intolerant people, there are a lot of products already out there.
Thinking of you! Emily
as I sit here eating a bowl of ice cream...very sorry to hear about the allergy results. Rachel was positive for peanuts when she was about 6. thankfully a couple years later it was negative, but two years without reeses cups was tough. and every candy known to man that is made with machines that process peanuts?! hang in there Ryan!
Post a Comment