This article is written by Jen R., a guest blogger and grown up "Food Allergic Kid" with some great insights on living with severe food allergies and still having a life...

Why the Peanut Planters Man is My Nemesis

So Lissa asked me to pull together some of my experiences and tips about being allergic to nuts since I was very young. We first found out in Lissa's Mecca (i.e. Disney World) when I was two and given a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. When I was very young, my reaction was primarily hives and swelling. After each accidental exposure over the next twenty something years, the reaction became much worse and the time I had to treat myself or get to the emergency room shortened.

My reaction to nuts is immediate and unmistakable. First my throat and tongue swell up. The feeling of your throat swelling is very, very painful and difficult to compare to say a sore throat or strep throat. My whole body becomes covered with hives and my skin feels like it's on fire. After an episode, I usually have terrible scratch marks all over my neck, chest, and arms from tearing at my skin. Simultaneously, it gets harder to breathe, which only makes you panic more and makes it even more difficult to breathe. I get dizzy and my blood pressure noticeably drops (my arms and legs start to tingle, as if they were asleep). My stomach reacts violently as well, and with tightening airways, expelling the reactant is a very dangerous and unpleasant experience, to say the least.

As such, I've learned to live with my allergy. Restaurants and eateries have not made it easy though. I am always happily surprised to see notes on menus telling customers to alert their servers as to any food allergies, but it is far too infrequent. Surprisingly, European countries are much more on the ball with servers actually asking each table if there are any food allergies. America is shockingly and frustratingly behind with training restaurant employees and food handlers on the proper handling of nut products. The FDA requires training on the proper handling of meat, chicken, and fish. Food allergies of all kinds should be added to such training. I hope this improves.

Going out to restaurants is very do-able though so long as you know what to ask about. I feel like with desserts, a nut's presence is much more obvious to a person previously unacquainted with food allergies, simply because many common desserts are made with nuts. But there are other foods out there that one wouldn't automatically think might have nuts, including waiters when you ask "does anything have nuts in it?" These foods include:

• Pesto- my last trip to the ER with anaphylaxis was because of a pesto spread on some Italian tapas. Pesto usually includes pine nuts, but occasionally now walnuts too. Ask about any nuts, or just steer clear from pesto in restaurants.
• Chili- never had an experience, but some chili is made with peanut butter to make it stickier so be careful.
• Marzipan- that sticky substance found in some Italian desserts. It's made with almond paste.
• Amaretto/ Gin: Steer clear of any drink with amaretto in it (made with almonds) and some gins are made with almonds as well. So tell your kid to have a vodka tonic instead (when the time comes, of course).
• Thai food: I always joke that I can never go to Thailand because the moment I step of the plane, I'd asphyxiate and die. Thai food is loooooaded with peanuts, peanut oil, peanut flour, etc. There is one Thai place that I frequent in DC only b/c the owner came out and spoke to me when I mentioned my allergy and asked if there was anything I could eat besides the miso soup. But otherwise, I avoid Thai restaurants like the plague, much to my chagrin.
• Chinese/ Vietnamese food: Very doable with a nut allergy, though you have to find a place you trust. Ask what kind of oil they use to cook everything, and so long as its vegetable oil, you should be fine. Mention the allergy and request that they use a separate clean pan and utensils for your meal. If they cook your General Tsos after someone else's Kung Pao, you're in trouble.
• Mexican/ Latin American food: Mexican restaurants are increasingly using peanut oil. Be sure to ask immediately what kind of oil they use (even for the tortilla chips)
• TCBY- they do not use separate spoons for the ice cream or the toppings last I was there. Way too risky and I won't go back because the teenage employees were too busy texting to listen to me.
• Panera- Melissa explained my beef with Panera. Any salad place for that matter-- you have to carefully watch the employee mixing others' salads that might contain nuts and then using the same bowl, tongs, gloved-hand, etc to mix yours.
• Coldstone- If you talk to the Coldstone employees and tell them you have a serious nut allergy, they will make your ice cream concoction on a separate coldstone (rather than the one where anything and everything gets mixed together). This is definitely one place whose employees are well-trained on allergy issues, but make sure to mention it.
• Five Guys & Chik-fil-a: Everything is cooked in peanut oil, so I just avoid these places. But they are very good about letting their customers know up front about their use of peanut oil and they should be commended for that.

Most Unpredictable Experience:
One of the most unpredictable peanut episodes was at Johnny Rockets. I'd eaten there plenty of times, and what possible peanut exposure could happen at a hamburger joint? I ordered my burger and a chocolate malt. I took a spoonful of my malt and immediately started reacting. I asked the waitress if there was peanut butter in my drink for some reason even though I had just ordered a chocolate malt and she said that they had used the same spoon in my drink that they had just used to mix some sort of peanut butter shake.

Stupidly, I didn't have my Benadryl or my Epipen on me, so I ran, wheezing and hysterical to the drug store across the parking lot, ripped open a Benadryl in the store and popped one. I immediately felt a little better. A few hours later though, I start feeling the same symptoms, only this time, I kept losing consciousness. Thank goodness my college roommate was home. She called 911 and I was rushed to the hospital (2 blocks away, mind you) in an ambulance with oxygen tubes up my nose. They pumped me full of steroids and I went home early the next morning. To think it could be called Jenny Rockets had I decided to sue (kidding :) ).

Another strange experience was when an ex-boyfriend of mine kissed me on the cheek when I met up with him one night. Immediately, my cheek swelled and became itchy. Turns out he had eaten a few peanuts from the bar earlier in the evening. While that was the extent of my reaction, it was shockingly interesting to me how such a small exposure created such an immediate skin reaction. To test to see if it was actually him having eaten a peanut that caused my cheek to swell up, he proceeded to kiss me on the other cheek. I then looked like a chipmunk all night. Hence, ex-boyfriend.

Other Nut-Related Tactics
• The "this product may contain or was made on the same equipment used to process tree nuts, etc" disclaimer: I find that companies put this line on packaging to cover themselves because of the rise in allergies these days. I avoid products from companies I've never heard of that have this line on their products, but if it's a pretty mainstream company (like Nabisco) and I've eaten their products before, I tend to view that warning as overly cautious.
• To make the severity of my allergy clear to waiters without pissing them off by sounding condescending or lecture-y, I state, "I am deadly allergic to all nuts, so if you could tell the chef that, I would appreciate it. I don't think business would go as well for you tonight if there was an ambulance outside and I was being revived at the table." A quick smile (or wink if the waiter is cute) and a "Thanks!" is usually all it takes to toe the line between "Don't kill me" and "I'm going to annoy you about this all night."