Confidently Coping With Food Allergies As A Parent
You may have already learned the food allergy basics about cross-contact, and reading labels, and maybe you’ve even found 1 or 2 allergy-friendly snacks and meals you can give your child.
But given the extra stress of keeping your child safe from food that’s everywhere, you might be wondering how to cope with food allergies as a parent.
I’ve got you covered!
Just so you know, I’m a 16-year multiple food allergy mom. Since 2017, I’ve helped thousands of mamas and families with my resources and business, Friendly Pantry Consulting.
Feel free to check out this post and many others I’ve written to help you navigate school, playdates, food allergy travel, trying new foods, and more!
Here are 5 tips for coping with food allergies as a loving parent.
Become efficient.
Become confident with advocating.
Create allergy-safe habits.
Get as much proven practical knowledge as possible.
Get a mentor you trust.
I know these tips need a bit more explanation, so let’s get to it!
Confidently Coping With Food Allergies As A Parent is Possible!
Become efficient.
If you really want to know how to cope with food allergies, this tip is really important, but it doesn’t get the recognition it deserves.
When you become efficient, you work smarter, not harder. This helps you relieve the constant mental load that weighs you down and can cause extra food allergy anxiety and worry.
Try working smarter, not harder when it comes to cooking, but also other things you do often as a food allergy mama like writing emails for playdates and birthday parties.
One of my favorite ways to become more efficient is to create templates. Find a template that works and then use them over and over. For example, figure out a weekly meal plan with recipes that your family loves and then reuse it once a month. Or create a template email that you send for all of your birthday party or social event invites and then cut and paste it over and over. This efficiency saves you so much time and effort!
Every time you start a habit that helps you become more efficient you take an exponential amount of weight from your shoulders.
2. Become confident with advocating.As a young mom with a food allergy child, I found it hard to ask for what we needed because I didn’t want to feel like a burden.
But, after 16 years, I realized that this was a big mistake and likely caused a lot more stress and worry than needed!
Now, one of my main tips for successfully coping with food allergies is to know what you need to keep your child safe, and why.
Learn how to explain these needs in a way that gets people to listen so you are truly heard. Because advocating isn’t about showing others how scary food allergies are (even though that’s part of it).
Instead, it’s MORE IMPORTANT to give people a REASON to look past their struggles & understand something they have no experience with.
I teach my process of doing this in my “Get Others To Take Food Allergies Seriously” Workshop .
3. Create safe habits and foster them in your child as they grow, ESPECIALLY around using the EpiPen & always carrying 2.No tips for coping with food allergies are complete without planning for the future, because the research shows that food allergy kids take more risks as they become teens.
Although kids need the help of an adult to keep them safe when they're little, creating good food allergy habits like always having epinephrine and not being afraid to use it, are essential. Start when they are young (and be consistent, even when it's hard), to help them take fewer risks as they get older.
4. Get as much practical knowledge as possible.
The problem is that practical knowledge doesn’t come quickly or easily because it comes from experience and lots of trial and error.
That means that the only way to get practical knowledge is by going through many years of life yourself OR getting it from someone you trust.
So if practical knowledge is so hard to get, it also means it's valuable, just like a diamond is valuable.
When you get a great source of practical knowledge, from someone who understands your challenges and has tested what they share with you over many years, you've found the diamond mine!This leads me to my next tip…
5. Get an experienced mentor you trust.
This is one of the most important tips for how to cope with food allergies. Having someone show you the ropes is one of the best ways to fast-track your knowledge and coping ability. Learning from someone else’s mistakes and getting the strategies that work are important so that your family can thrive.
Confidently Cope With Food Allergies and Thrive!
If you’re an anaphylactic food allergy mom or dad who wants to help your family cope and thrive with food allergies, check out my low-cost workshop series.
This series is on-demand so that you can learn whenever it works for you. It’s filled with all the lessons I’ve learned the hard way, so you don’t have to.
Food Allergy Kid’s Empowerment Guide
As a Food Allergy Coach, I know that daycare/preschool and school can be a scary transition for food allergy parents. If your child is starting in the next year, I’ve got a free resource that will help you prepare your child ages 2-7 for more independence. It’s never too early or late to start! This free guide is perfect. Sign up today!
