Talking Allergies

Karen -- I've wondered about this too...I'm not food allergic but I've read that children who are lucky enough to outgrow peanut allergy are instructed to eat peanut regularly to maintain their "non-allergic" status. So - I started wondering, if someone were to all of a sudden eliminate a food from their diet (like my husband and I have done with nuts) would that increase the liklihood of developing an allergy to nuts?

I certainly think that genetics plays a very strong role. However I do not understand how this fits with exposing your kids to allergens early in life as a form of prevention. My youngest I feel was extremely allergic to many things at birth.
I am ana to shell fish, environmental allergens, and have asthma.
My husband had severe exzema as a child adn lots of environmental allergens.
My oldest is dogs and peanuts.
My youngest is ana to nuts, legumes, fish, dairy, eggs, and has environmental allergens.
My parents adn husbands parents both had no known allergies.
My niece has oral allergy syndrome.
Stephanie

I'm not a parent so I unfortunately cannot relate the stress of having children with allergies, but my sister has developed a severe shellfish and fish allergy in the last year at the age of 20 and my mother has developed the same allergy in the last month. I am 23 and have just developed a mild allergy to tree nuts. There are only the two us and my parents and my father is not allergic to anything as far as I know.

I was told that one of the reasons that I am allergic to different foods could be due to blood types since different blood types are apparently more susceptible to different allergens. My mom and my sister are Rhesus blood types and I’m not so I think there is some validity in this belief.

Is it usual to develop allergies so late in life - in your 20's and 50s in my family's case?

I might as well jump in...
I have asthma, environmental allergies and I have strong skin and respiratory reactions to chlorine and some other chemical solvents.
My sister had severe eczema growing up and still flares up when stressed or during seasonal changes. She has diagnosed OAS to several uncooked fruits and vegetables, and allergies to cats, dogs, dust mites and environmental allergens such as various pollens.
My dad has severe env. allergies, as well as many animals (dogs, cats, horses).
My mom has undiagnosed stinging insect allergy. She smoked during her pregnancies with both my sister and I. We had dogs and cats (and mice and roaches - ah, downtown Toronto living ) growing up.

My husband's side - no known allergies for either parent (don't know about his uncle). DH broke out in hives once after eating peanut when he was five, and has not eaten them or had a reaction since. I made him have a skin test a few years ago (age 24, I believe), which was inconclusive. So we don't know if he's still allergic or not, but he avoids peanut just in case. His sister has undiagnosed asthma and environmental allergies (she also smokes, which doesn't help with the wheezing). His brother has no known allergies or asthma.

We don't have any kids yet, but the running joke in our house is that when we do, they'll be tall, skinny, dark-haired, big-nosed people who will probably be allergic to everything!

Dory

My husband had environmental allergies as a child. He was also allergic to horses, dogs and cats.
My oldest son isn't allergic to anything (knock on wood)
My daughter has Oral Allergy Syndrome, she is allergic to birch, and cats.
My youngest son is allergic to penicillin, biaxin, peanuts, cats, birch....
I don't have any allergies to speak of.

As for extended family, I don't know of any allergies.