Talking Allergies

When you are first diagnosed with a food allergy are you thrilled to have discovered what has been making you so sick? Or are you surprised at how ill a tiny bit of allergen can make you and is it overwhelming?

How did you find out and what was the first thing you did after you were diagnosed?

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Moderator
Daughter: asthma, allergies to egg, milk, peanuts, tree nuts, most legumes (not soy and green beans) & penicillin. Developing hayfever type allergies.
Husband: no allergies
Me: Oral Allergy Syndrome, Allergic to Birch trees

Thank you for opening this thread. There are a lot of us who have adult onset anaphylaxis. And yes it did Knock the Wind Out of Me!! I have just tried to find all the emotions I went through that day. At the moment I do not have time to write more, but will later. Thanks again for this thread and I look forward to hearing others comments.

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Sue
Adult on-set anaphylaxis - penicillin, shellfish, crustaceans

Diagnosis didn't come easy.

I was suspecting a food allergy, but was having great difficulty figuring out what food. At the time, I was babysitting for a friend who's son had multiple food allergies, which is why I was familiar with them at all.

Testing wasn't working. One time, I'd test positive to everything, another, negative to everything.

It was a trip to the ER while having an anaphylactic reaction that finally pinpointed sesame seeds. Then, seeing "may contain trace amounts of sesame seeds" on a bag of bread was my "aha moment". That's why I was reacting all the time -- I was eating trace amounts.

I would say it was a relief because after buying a bread machine and staying out of restaurants I was finally not having reactions.

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self: allergy to sesame seeds and peanuts
3 sons each with at least one of the following allergies: peniciilin, sulfa-based antibiotic, latex, insect bites/stings

For years I suffered from asthma, constant fatigue and pneumonia that never seemed to go away I finally found I was allergic to almost everything I breathe. (pollens, trees, mold) After2 years on allergy shots I am almost off the puffers and have not needed an antibiotic yet. It was a relief to know the fatigue was real and I was not being "lazy", I just couldn't do many things. Unfortunately the clear lungs and sinuses have come at a high price. I cannot eat any fruit that comes from a tree and lately even berries which last summer was the only fruit I could eat. I don't get ana but feel short of breath if I try an apple and even a tiny bit will keep me in the washroom the entire next day.

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allergic to all tree pollens except grass, hazelnuts, fruit and some veggies

The food allergies was like the wind was knocked out of me. I've known for quite a few years that I've had some form of enviromental allergies, and that they were getting worse - the itching, sneezing in the spring were getting very bad, plus I couldn't be out when dh was mowing the lawn. But, the day that I bit into a fresh peach - well, that one hit me like a tonne of bricks. It was just a tiny sliver, but that tinly sliver had my throat closing up on me, and sent me running for some benadryl - 20 min later, I had a nice covering of hives. Since then, it's been like an explosion of food allergies - one of the most perplexing things I've gone thru in my life! The food allergies (raw and cooked) include:
peaches
plums
cherries
(basically any pitted fruit)
apples
pears (and I have two perfect pear trees in the back yard that produced over 70 lbs of pears last year ( )
potatoes
strawberries
kiwis
tree nuts (specifically hazelnuts, pecans, and almonds).


I'm also sensitive to fragrances and tobacco smoke. At my last allergist appt, she said that I am at risk for latex allergy (oh yeah). I also, last spring, developed asthma on top of everything else. So, not only do I have the anapylactic food allergies (the fruit allergies are NOT OAS) , but I am at a much higher risk of having a really bad reaction due to the asthma. Sometimes I feel like I'm falling apart, and I am beginging to HATE label reading. You can't believe how many things they stick potatoe flour/starch into these days!

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Dawne - Ana to all pitted fruits, POTATOES, strawberries, kiwis, pumpkin, apple, pear; + asthma, hayfever, migraines, fragrance sensitive
dh -nil
DD (1999) - asthma, hayfever, latex/red dye sensitive
DD (2003)- ana to mosquitos (risk all stinigng insects)

I thin latex is associated with kiwi. And I know latex is associated with banana.

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self: allergy to sesame seeds and peanuts
3 sons each with at least one of the following allergies: peniciilin, sulfa-based antibiotic, latex, insect bites/stings

Just wondering how many of you are are at the age of perimenopause? I have a girlfriend with adult onset asthma, grass allergy and fragrance allergy. She is thinking it may be related to perimenopause, as her hormones are starting to change, and we have both read that allergies can start at this time.

I was in my 20's when it started for me. So, not perimenopausal at the time.

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self: allergy to sesame seeds and peanuts
3 sons each with at least one of the following allergies: peniciilin, sulfa-based antibiotic, latex, insect bites/stings

I was 36 when the food allergies hit (early 30's when the hayfever started), so can't blame it on perimenopause. I do however have family history against me.

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Dawne - Ana to all pitted fruits, POTATOES, strawberries, kiwis, pumpkin, apple, pear; + asthma, hayfever, migraines, fragrance sensitive
dh -nil
DD (1999) - asthma, hayfever, latex/red dye sensitive
DD (2003)- ana to mosquitos (risk all stinigng insects)

In my case, the answer to Susan's question is that the wind was literally knocked out of me (full-on wheezing), then later it was a relief to know.

This is because my adult onset diagnoses have come via anaphylaxis:
a. first was in 1993 with shellfish, which I'd eaten no problem before. Major, awful reaction, went to Emerg. Biphasic symptoms followed.
b. 2nd anaphylaxis episode in 2004 was due to soy and peanut in a satay sauce. Subsequently tested very allergic to soy and allergic, though less off-the-charts, to peanut.

The soy/peanut diagnoses were baffling but in some ways a relief. I'd been sick to my stomach before eating peanut, but never put two-and-two together. I didn't have a lot of peanut in my diet, had developed an aversion to PB after being nauseated with it, but definitely had other exposures where I wasn't ill or if there were symptoms, they weren't memorable enough to relate to peanut. So the allergy wasn't obvious until after the anaphylaxis and the subsequent testing.

The biggest adjustment was soy. When the big no. 2 anaphylaxis event happened, I'd never even heard of soy as an allergen. So while I suspected peanut (more obvious with satay), I didn't consciously avoid soy - until I almost stopped eating anything but rice, chicken and unseasoned vegetables while waiting to see the allergist for allergy testing. This was because I kept having reactions. I had a 2nd anaphylactic reaction, 2nd trip to the ER within a week of the satay one. It would have been a soy exposure (marinade for flank steak). I won't sugarcoat: that was a scary time. It's most unsettling when you really don't know what you can safely eat. The allergist's nurse told me to take Reactine daily and eat very plain food until we got the testing done.

It was certainly good to know, finally, that soy (and peanut) were the culprits, and all symptoms disappeared once I started avoiding soy, too. So that was the sigh of relief. Frustrating period, though, coming to grips with soy allergy. Soy is an emulsifier used in a huge number of foods. It's not just about avoiding Asian food.

Today, I'm used to my allergies, can usually even predict what will contain soy. And I'm healthier. For years, I'd have minor, unexplained bouts of nausea. I suspect that was the soy talking.

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Allergic to soy, peanut, shellfish, penicillin

with our son, we suspected two allergies, but came out with a whole arm full.
stunned, we were handed leaflets and told to 'never vacum when he is in the house' ..............he was 18 months old, were was i supposed to put him?

we got more food allergies , and all the envrionmental allergies.

yeah, we had the wind knocked out of us......................but, by the next time we went back for next appointment, we had more food allergies to add on the list, which the confirmed.

so, bit of an ongoing shock really.

I have had a fish allergy for as long as I can remember... but the long list of other ones came between the ages of 18 to 28. For me, it was actually a sigh of relief. Thankfully none of those were anaphylactic... at the time.

Looking back, I can trace them many years before that, but they just one day decided to react 100 time more than before at a rate of about one new one every year!!!! So the intesity of them was a full surprise, but the fact that they existed... well, I knew something was wrong with me and given that I already had some allergies, I suspected something along those lines.

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anaphylaxis (even to smell): fish
severe allergy: milk, carrots, pineapple, kiwi
moderate allergy: soy, mango, avocado
oral allergy syndrom to most fruits
(partial list only... and does not include food intolerances)

Mylène, didn't realize you had adult onset milk allergy.

That's uncommon, and not an easy adjustment.

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Allergic to soy, peanut, shellfish, penicillin

I was not thrilled to have finally discovered that I had food allergies. The only one I suspected was an allergy to dairy products. I had been getting shots for my environmental allergies--I'm allergic to everything that goes airborne (Trees, grass, dog, cat, mold, ragweed, dust mites.) I was not getting much better, so I had a full battery of allergy testing. I reacted to so many things--green peas, lima beans, chocolate, milk/dairy, soy/soybeans, wheat, egg whites, peanuts, tree nuts (walnuts, almonds.) In additions to the milk allergy, I also am lactose intolerant. I reacted to so many things that my body could not handle it--I ended up in the ER with severe allergic reactions and had to have an IV of Bendaryl and and IV of prednisone. Peas were my favorite vegetable and I ate peanuts and cashews regularly without reacting before the testing. I also ate chocolate my whole life. Now if I eat these items I have reactions ranging from just facial flushing to serious allergic reactions includiing angiodema. The only food allergy I suspected was to milk, I had difficulty with milk products since my late teens, but the symptoms were more like an intolerance.

I think my lifetime with excema may have had something to do with allergies though.

Now I can only have blood test to determine allergies. My skin is probably too sensitive to the small injections of allergens and was probably the reason my system got overwhelmed.

rsox34, skin tests can be and often are unrelable because there is so many varables that can effect them. My fiance has the same reacting to soy on a skin test as egg but in a blood test soy will have no reaction at all where as egg will. I definately know you are feeling really overwhelmed right now but I think when you get your blood test results back, you'll hopefully have that list cut in half.

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Moi: Pineapples, Turkey and Asthma.
Fiance: Ana. to Dairy, Eggs, Peanuts/Nuts and Horse. Also has asthma.