This month, Sam comes face to face with the dilemma of allergy safety and reasonable expectations at her son’s elementary school. The other evening I’m at a school event with the kids. It’s movie night, so I’m towing a bag of treats, including some ketchup-flavored potato chips (my fave), gummies (theirs) and a few other [...]

This month, Sam finds herself a teary mess facing an uncertain future. Why? Her son’s food-allergy aware principal is leaving his job. Readers who’ve been with me since the start of this blog may remember when it was still referred to in ancient journalistic terms as a column (back in the dark ages of 2006). [...]

Samantha Yaffe’s opinionated view of motherhood with allergies. This month, Sam has a distressing encounter with Air Canada’s new allergy policy. “Sorry ma’am, but your son cannot board this plane if he hasn’t been cleared by our med desk at least 48 hours in advance,” says the airline employee at the gate in Miami. “It’s [...]

Samantha Yaffe’s opinionated view of motherhood with allergies. I never post anything on my Facebook wall. Never had a good reason to move past my inherent voyeurism. But on the morning of this year’s Santa Claus Parade in Toronto – the 106th seasonal dose of pre-Christmas spirit in the city – I couldn’t resist telling [...]

Remember when a peanut allergy was The Peanut Allergy? When it was so nouveau, so under-understood, we’d speak about it like it was The Plague or some dreadful affliction that only happens in other people’s families? When my older son Lucas was first diagnosed with multiple food allergies (including The Peanut) six years ago, we [...]

Samantha Yaffe’s frank take on motherhood with allergies Our allergic journey is anything but predictable. But until last week, I was relatively confident with my system for allergy management, and the second nature of my vigilance. As it goes, every person who looks after Lucas gets my thorough EpiPen tutorial and a line-by-line explanation of [...]

Samantha Yaffe’s frank take on motherhood with allergies Last year, out of nowhere, Lucas started to complain about wearing his EpiPen to school. Until that point he’d been pretty cooperative about it, choosing instead to grumble about bedtime, mealtime, Wii time, his little brother, the fact that our living room is not a basketball court [...]

Samantha Yaffe’s frank take on motherhood with allergies When Lucas was about 3, I had him enrolled two afternoons a week in this cute little neighbourhood program. On account of his allergies, the kind people in charge declared the space peanut- and nut-free, directly informing each parent (or nanny) to send only nut-free snacks for [...]

Samantha Yaffe’s frank take on motherhood with allergies  So, it’s Grade 2, not Grade 1, not kindergarten – just a not-so remarkable year in Lucas’ continuing grade-school education and our family’s life-long allergic journey, which regardless of the grade seldom goes without drama and extra-special attention. Last year, when Lucas was entering Grade 1, there was [...]

Samantha Yaffe’s frank take on motherhood with allergies. A few years back, we found ourselves between allergists. Our first one died a year after Lucas was diagnosed with peanut, tree nut and egg, and the second one was, well – to put it mildly – not a good fit. After pulling a few strings, Lucas, [...]