Children’s Food Allergies

Food allergies affect between 5% and 7.5% of all children, whereas only 1% to 2% of all adults are affected. So parents, be encouraged. This means your children may outgrow their food allergies.

But those figures may surprise you - doesn’t it seem like many more people complain of food allergies? That’s because we must differentiate between a true “food allergy” and “food intolerance”.

What’s the difference between food allergies and food intolerance?

“Food allergies” are usually due to an imbalance in the immune system. The immune system mistakes a food for a harmful substance, and causes the cells to make antibodies called “immunoglobulin E” to fight it. This releases chemicals and histamines. The symptoms can be:

For example, “celiac disease”, which may cause extreme pain and dysfunction after ingesting wheat, is a full-blown allergy to wheat. But “irritable bowel” (alternating constipation and diarrhea), where wheat just doesn’t digest very well, is a food intolerance.

Both can have underlying causes

Food allergies and food intolerance can be caused by not enough “good” stomach bacteria to help digestion; parasites, yeast infection, or “leaky gut” (tears in the intestinal lining which allows food particles out into the body, often leading to reflux). Unfortunately, treatments like epinephrine spray for asthma-like reactions, or acid reflux medication for heartburn, don’t get to the root problem. Dependence on the medication can result.

Furthermore, especially in children, there can be adverse personality side effects. Food allergies and food intolerance can cause children to be moody, irritable and hyperactive. Cases of children’s food allergies or food intolerance where children exhibit irregular behavior have even been misdiagnosed as ADD/ADHD. The pity of this is that children are placed on medication without looking for a deeper source.

Common Food Offenders

These items commonly cause food allergies with mild to severe symptoms:

• Milk (generally cow’s milk)
• Soy milk and/or soybean products
• Wheat
• Peanuts (whereas fine with other types of nuts)
• All nuts
• Shellfish or all fish
• Food dye
• Citrus or melon fruits (strawberries the most common)

• The lactose only in milk and other dairy products (stomach ache, mucus buildup)
• Sugar (headaches, hyperactivity then “crashing”, mucus buildup, yeast infections)
• Wheat, oats, bran fiber, white rice (these contain “gluten”, a sticky substance that holds them together causing digestive problems).
• Chocolate (headaches, hyperactivity, lactose-related symptoms)
• MSG, soy sauce (headaches, pounding heart, tingling of lips and tongue)
• Pork products (digestive upsets and delays, nausea)
• Corn (constipation)
• Beans (flatulence, usually brown beans)

How to prevent attacks
This can work for either food allergies or food intolerance:

• Keep a record of what they ate or drank before a reaction.
• Eliminate one thing at a time so you can be sure of the cause.
• Replace dairy with brown rice-based products: rice milk, ice cream, and cheese substitutes are available at health food stores.
• Replace wheat and oats with millet, brown rice and other grains. Hot cream of rice can replace hot cream of wheat cereal.
• Eliminate sugary foods and drinks, sugar substitutes, high fructose corn syrup, honey, molasses, sucrose. Again, there are delicious sugar-free products at health food outlets.
• For fiber, serve fruits with skin, green or red beans, lentils, vegetables. Sweet potatoes are great sources of fiber – often containing 5 more grams than a dish of spinach!