Today, somebody asked elsewhere about starting their kid on fish.

[conuly]

And let me just say that I am *so tired* of people referring to eating a new food as "introducing" it to their kid. I know what they mean, and it's certainly not novel, but I can't shake the impression that they're going "Kid, meet fish. Fish, kid. Now you can be BEST FRIENDS! Go off and play!"

But I digress.

The woman said she had no "history of food allergies", very specific there.

Except that many people actually do have an intolerance to foods and don't realize it. Why? Because when they think of "food allergies" they think mostly of stomach upsets - nausea or diarrhea - or they think of hives, or they think of fatal problems.

(And sometimes they don't even realize their stomach problems are food related! They think it's normal to have chronic gas, to be constantly bloated, or to always be constipated/runny!)

They don't think of eczema as being related to food. They don't think of asthma as being potentially triggered by food. They don't think of stuffiness and congestion as having anything to do with what they eat. They certainly don't think of mood and behavior problems as being related to common foods - or if they do, they think of it only in the context of artificial colors and sugar.

Of course, the reality is that food intolerances can cause all of these problems. So I'm posting this as a PSA - if you constantly have any of these problems, and nothing works, or you're so used to it that you just use stopgaps all the time? Try keeping a food diary. See if there's any connection.

Comments

[isabeau.livejournal.com]

Makes me kind of wonder how many (if any) of my mood and sleep-related issues are actually food allergies in disguise.

:/

[conuly]

Could be none. Could be all of them.

And, of course, you can overthink this. If you end up controlling your whole life to avoid problem foods you may solve the sleep and mood problems but get a whole *new* set of problems to replace them.