Cheryl Marks Young
5 Helpful Apps for Allergy Parents
Allergy parents know it’s not possible to monitor children and their food allergies every hour of the day, but your memory is often what keeps them free from danger. This can mean piles of stress for everyone involved, and that’s no way to live. Fortunately, we live in the age of innovation and technology, and almost everyone owns a smartphone of some kind. The good news is that hundreds of resources exist right at our fingertips—and these resources can be vital for reducing the stress of managing dangerous food allergies. Here are five great apps that can help ease the...
Cheryl Marks Young
Holiday Spotlight: Christmas Cookies and Candies on Allergic-Santa’s Nice List
Your son’s preschool class has a holiday party at the end of the week. Your daughter’s Daisy Girl Scout troop is doing a cookie exchange at their December meeting. Your family has been invited to a friend’s pot-luck holiday luncheon on the weekend and that’s just the start of the festivities. You, like the rest of those attending these events, will be baking cookies and other treats to contribute. On one hand, that’s a good thing: It means you know there will at least be one safe thing for your allergic family members to snack on while you’re there. Of...
Cheryl Marks Young
Holiday Spotlight: How to Have a Happy, Allergy-Friendly Hanukkah
Welcome to the holiday season. As much as we enjoy the opportunity to celebrate with family and friends, this stretch of time between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day can be a minefield for allergic families. Dinners, cookie exchanges, edible gifts, classroom parties – and that’s just the beginning. It can be hard to relax and enjoy the festivities when you’re worrying over what dish is safe and which is not. Here’s the good news: You can relax and enjoy by adapting some of the holidays’ traditional fare to meet your allergy needs. Volunteer to contribute a dish to the family...
Cheryl Marks Young
Thanksgiving 101: Cooking an Allergen-Free Meal You Can Be Grateful For
Next week, families across the US will pull up their chairs to their tables and dig into delectable Thanksgiving feasts. There will be turkey, potatoes, cranberry-something-or-other, and a variety of other fixings. Gorging on all that goodness is a holiday right, or so it seems. For an allergic individual, however, the Thanksgiving table can a minefield of potential reaction-inducing challenges. The dairy-allergic person doesn’t see creamy, scrumptious mashed potatoes, he sees milk and butter hiding in potato. The wheat-allergic person doesn’t see warm rolls to melt butter across, she sees a reason to make sure her auto-injector is easily accessible....