A Brief Background of My Allergies

I was diagnosed a little over 2 years ago with allergies to wheat, corn, dairy and tomatoes. Six months after that soy was added to the list. Most people ask if I always had these allergies or if they just appeared. At first it seemed like they came out of nowhere, but looking back I do believe I had some symptoms of food allergies growing up. But I also think a strange stomach virus (a year before my actual diagnosis) set off these allergies, or at least made symptoms worse. I also have many environmental/inhalant allergies (ragweed, trees, grasses, mold, dust, cats/dogs, roach, etc, etc, etc!) that seemed to have come out of nowhere after a bout with bronchitis and strep the fall of my 7th grade year.

In January of this year I was having more reactions again and was desperately trying to get to the bottom of the recurrence of these reactions. I was grateful my doctor was supportive of having more testing done. The tests did not reveal any new allergies, for which I was thankful. The reactions seem to have stemmed from eating peanut butter with unlabled soy in it and applesauce with citric acid, which is a form of corn--I forgot to check that label since it had been sitting in my cupboard for several months (I bought it before I knew about citric acid being corn). The past few months have reminded me I have to always be on guard for hidden forms of my food allergies. If only labeling laws were stricter! But I digress and we'll save that for a future post.

I don't think I would ever choose to have food allergies (or environmental, although, they are less debilitating for me)--I don't think anyone with food allergies would! But 2 and 1/2 years on this side of being diagnosed I have learned some important lessons, especially regarding my walk with the Lord, which I hope to be able to share throughout the course of this blog.