Allergies and Fear / by Val Joy

Allergies! I’ve lived with them my whole life. One fear / anxiety / worry would layer on top of another until I only felt safe with rice and boiled vegetables, but the food was never the enemy. My erupting rashes, breath-taking asthma, and diarrhea didn’t manifest because of beef, nightshade vegetables, raw food, or that stolen scoop of ice cream. When I looked inside instead of out - at the anger I held in my liver, the hurt my heart struggled to beat through, and the beating my self-esteem had taken - I could see where the solutions actually lay.

A recent Sunday Morning piece on peanut allergies piqued my interest, amusement, and hope, finally elicitng a sigh. Instead of absolute avoidance, doctors were now recommending that parents cautiously reintroduce peanuts and peanut butter to their children. Okay, I thought, whatever the experts’ rationale, it’s good to retrain the body not to default into fear at the sight of a peanut. The sigh came when I noticed there were still deeper connections to make. What fears and stresses had been in the minds and bodies of these children that their bodies went into “overflow”? I wondered when it would come that our society is courageous enough to look?

…Or would we continue to train the magnifying glass looking out and all around at the latest food or environmental factor to add to our Enemies List?