Oh Baby it’s Cold Outside…Achoo!

Every year around this time we spend more time indoors, the heat is cranked and inevitably one of us gets sick and then “shares” it with the rest of the family. My daughter, L, has gone to daycare since she was 3.5 months old (she is now 2) and this will be our 3rd New England winter. It seems like every winter, we go through an epic number of Boogie Wipes. I’m hoping that we’ll stay relatively cough and cold-free this year now that she’s a bit older and not prone to sticking absolutely every toy in her mouth that every other kid from daycare has inevitably drooled or chewed on.

We’ve been really lucky because L has been really healthy her whole life, in fact we have only had one unscheduled doctor’s visit since she was born! In my circle of playgroup pals, I have realized how many parents have questions about how often their kids get sick and is there something that they could do nutrition-wise or environmentally to help their kids thrive. Maybe I’m just more attuned to this because in my non-mom role, I teach Nutrition courses at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University and also do Asthma Research at Children’s Hospital Boston.

To try to dispel some of the myths and misconceptions about allergies and asthma, I contacted Mama J to see if the Boston Baby Mama readers would be interested in me contributing regularly to the blog. One of the topics that Mama J was interested in hearing about was how much genetics comes into play in allergies and asthma, so I’ll be working on a post about that soon, but so that I can get other ideas, please send topics of interest my way to the email asthma@childrens.harvard.edu or please post a comment!

Food Allergies: Mama W's story

Why do so many kids have food allergies nowadays? 30 years ago I didn't not have one friend that had a food allergy. I ate PB & J almost every day for lunch in my school cafeteria or class room...which is unheard of now as far as I know.

I knock on wood, cross my fingers and say a prayer every day that my daughter does not get food allergies. I am a total foodie, and more importantly a lover of all dairy, nuts and basically anything that kids get allergies too. My daughter cannot have allergies. Now that we are feeding her so many different things I worry that she will have an allergic reaction to everything she puts in her mouth. 

Everyone knows at least a couple people that have a child with some sort of food allergies, and I have heard countless stories about how their lives have changed. I asked my friend Mama W to share her story about her son and his allergies. 
 

Mama W:
Famous last words as a teacher: I hope my child doesn't have allergies. I always felt bad for my students who had allergies- singled out with a different snack or their parents would send in "special food". It was heart breaking and parents would hound you that the classroom was nut free. I had one student who was nut free because his father had a nut allergy.

When my son was about 5 months old he had horrible eczema. Those fire engine, chapped cheeks that were painful to look at. The pediatrician put us on the fancy formula- the one above the soy. The stuff was not cheap! We were lucky that my father in law was an allergist, so he tested our son. He tested for peanuts, milk, wheat, eggs, soy and dogs. Low and behold, our son reacted to eggs, peanuts, and dogs. The reactions to peanuts & dogs were mild. We have a dog and I feared we would have to give her away.