We have found that the combination of an accurate diagnosis, a wonderful allergist, careful label reading and Morgan’s growing self-advocacy has kept him aware and even with the worst of occurrences – anaphylactic shock – he was able to identify what was occurring. Using shocking words got their attention, but sometimes it only served to scare other people, and made his allergy seem to be even more unmanageable. I was scared, and I wanted other people to know the seriousness of Morgan’s allergy. Anytime food was offered, I would tell a long story of peanut allergies, his reaction, his potential reactions…to the point of boring the other person to death. We weren’t aware of the number of times we would have to think ahead, planning and packing a different snack. We were constantly surprised at the number of times food was being offered to our son. Our “old” carefree life was gone and a hyper vigilant life took its place. We were overwhelmed and then some! Eating out at restaurants became a planned event vacations were put on hold babysitters had to be versed in the use of the epinephrine kit and even shopping in the local grocery store required hours of reading labels on boxes. We had all of these questions too when Morgan was formally diagnosed at 18 months old with severe peanut allergies (although he’d already had a contact reaction at 9 months old), along with many other food and pet allergies. People continue to ask us how we found out he was allergic, will he ever outgrow any allergies, and how do we live a normal life? Our son, Morgan, is now 25 years old, a college graduate, and has lived with food allergies his entire life. Living with food allergies has become quite normal for our family.

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