Like all families with children with allergies, the day arrives when you need to prepare your child, yourself and the school for your child to enter school. As we prepared ourselves for public school earlier this school year, we realized how easy it had been in day care, relatively speaking. The daycare we used was nut-free and in fact made her classroom free of anything she was allergic to. She was not excluded from anything – kids didn’t eat foods near her that could be dangerous to her and the school didn’t do any projects that she couldn’t participate in.
It’s been a shock in many ways to have moved into the public school system. We’re fortunate in that our cafeteria doesn’t serve nuts or peanut butter. BUT, any child can bring peanut butter for lunch. My daughter has to sit at a nut free table. She can ask a friend to sit with her but they have buy lunch in the cafeteria in order to sit with her. Initially at the beginning of the school year a friend would sit with her – now they want to sit at the regular tables with everyone else. Luckily for my child, she has found a friend from another class who likewise sits at the allergy table. They’re in different grades so I wonder what will happen when they’re no longer in the same school. For now, though, my daughter has the occasional dream in which she goes to school and there’s an additional allergy table, and another, and another until the whole cafeteria is only allergy tables.
My daughter’s class is relatively small (16 children) and we’ve been fortunate to have a fabulous teacher and lots of mothers who are sensitive to Morgan’s allergies. I became the class party mom so that I could develop and manage the class parties. Many people who are not close to children with allergies don’t realize the impact on children when they are excluded because they can not participate in an activity or eat the food that all the other children are eating. Although I am always appreciative when some one makes the effort not to have foods that are dangerous to her, they often stop there and serve mostly food that she can’t eat – forcing her to feel excluded. Being the party Mom has permitted me to plan the parties and the foods. The other families I have worked with for the parties have been wonderful and understanding and so far this year, my daughter could do everything and eat everything at the parties we’ve had. This has been wonderful for her!
Tip:
As a parent of a child with allergies, there are some things that are out of our control and many things that we can control. I try to control those things that I can, such as being the party mom for her class. By taking charge in this way, I am able to control her environment. Morgan becomes sad when she feels excluded, like many children with allergies. By planning the parties myself, I know the party will be as fun for her as it is for all the other children.
