the beginning

I was trying to think of healthy foods to feed my eight-month-old, Chloe, and my sister suggested whole milk yogurt.

In no way do I blame her for what happened next: Chloe ended up in the emergency room with an anaphylactic reaction to the milk. Her oxygen was low and she was itchy, red, hoarse, and crying.

They gave her benadryl and steroids, and prescribed an epi-pen to carry with us everywhere.

When we got home I knew that her reality had changed for the foreseeable future, and mine and our whole family's along with it.

We have a three-year-old son and a fifteen-year-old nephew living with us. We all like to eat, and we aside from carefully introducing foods to Andrew, our son, we never really thought about food.

Now we have to think about it all the time. Or at least, as the primary chef, and chief organizer of the family, I do.

The hardest part about it is feeling like we have to reinvent the wheel all over again. We're on the learning curve, no one else is, so it's all up to us.

Sometimes the responsibility of keeping her alive and growing is overwhelming. It often feels like the juggernaut of the food production industry is totally against us.

This blog will hopefully address all the issues we, and other families coming to terms with a child's severe food allergies, often have to deal with.

In addition to being severely allergic to cow's milk, Chloe is also allergic to eggs, wheat, peanut, dog, and cat. We haven't tested her for tree nuts but it often goes along with a peanut allergy. And speak nothing of fish and shellfish--we won't test for those until farther along the road, or even introduce them.

I have my up days and my down days. Like most parents, we love our daughter so much and would do anything for her, so when people say, oh, it must be so hard!, we just smile and say, she's our daughter.