Going "out to eat" has become such a normal activity in today's society. Which is totally fine, who doesn't love going out with family or friends and enjoying a delicious meal? For many the answer is very simple, no one; everyone loves going out to eat. However, it is not that simple for some. It can be a completely nerve-racking and unsettling situation. Around 15 million Americans have food allergies, but only 0.6 percent - 1.3 percent of the United States population suffer from a peanut allergy.
Some people are born with their allergies and some develop them over time. I, for example, was born with my allergy. The first reaction happened when I was around 1 year old and my mother had fed me bites of a peanut butter sandwich, not a single thought of what would happen next ever crossed her mind. She turned around to put dishes in the sink and when I started to cry she immediately turned back around. Hives, had taken over my whole body, my face was swollen, I was crying and gasping for air. My mom was as frightened as any mother would be at the sight of her baby in that condition. It was just a peanut butter sandwich after all. From then on it was never anything but a floor of eggshells. Not eating always seemed like the better option. When I was a few years older I started only drinking water and eating things that I felt comfortable in my head consuming. I lost a lot of weight and became extremely fatigued. There was nothing anyone could say or do to get me to eat because in my head, anything could contain peanuts, and I was not ready to die.
When I try to travel, I can not eat out. Jamaica was beautiful and the people there were amazing. But the most nerve-racking thing being in a different country, is that same question "What if I eat something I can't have on accident?" I was lucky enough to have a travel agent that knew how to inform every eatery we came in contact with. Cancun is a different story, no one understood English who cooked on the resort, I had to get a card that explained my allergy to the cooks, and from then on I could only eat fruit and brick-oven pizza. Which doesn't sound bad at all but after six straight days of it, it can definitely cause a sour stomach. While traveling out west and down south I found that they use peanut oil in a lot of their product. Like I mentioned before, not eating always seems like the better option.
I remember people saying to me or my mother, "Peanuts? In this?" or, "Really, come on. There aren't any nuts in this bread." or my favorite, "Nothing is going to happen, just eat it." In elementary school, I brought my lunch, but one day I had forgotten it so I had to buy. I was pretty far back in the line and when they would run out of the main meal, you would be given a sandwich whether you liked it or not. I just so happened to be given a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I repeatedly told the lunch lady that I am allergic and can't have that sandwich, I couldn't even use the same tray as one that had been sitting on it. She clicked her tongue, rolled her eyes, and began to yell at me to take the sandwich because that is all there is.
People do not understand the severity of some allergies. Simply because to some, ignorance is bliss. Some simply have the mindset of, why bother to learn or care about what could happen to those who it effects, if it doesn't effect me? And that is just a shame. Unfortunately, there will always be those people. There will always be people making those with allergies seem like an inconvenience, eye-rolls, tongue clicks, shakes of the heads, and sighs. But there will never, ever be another one of me or anyone else with an allergy. So all the extra precautions I have to take to make sure I live through one more meal is damn well worth it all to me.
The point of my article is to make people aware of the fact that, an allergy isn't as simple as you see in the commercials for Epi-Pen's or another auto-injectors. You don't just simply look down, see hives and use the Epi-Pen, one and done. It is a constant, everyday struggle of reading and memorizing labels, asking about ingredients, "Do you have an allergy menu?" And hoping to God that the next bite you take isn't your last.
