Am I Shellfish? Allergy Challenge that didn't go to plan
This is going to be a short one.
At the beginning of the year I did two food challenges with banana and avocado (two foods that I have always wanted in my diet) and they were both successful. If you want to read about them and my experiences please read the blog posts I did.
As those two were successful I was “fearless” and my anxiety was substantially reduced, I felt more comfortable in challenging foods that I have previously been allergic to.
Enter shellfish.
Prawns and scallops had been a very low reaction on my skin prick test and low on blood tests. When I was child I ate prawns regularly. My allergist put in a requested to have me challenge these foods. I was optimistic.
The day of the challenge I wasn’t nervous like the previous times, I was excited to get a new food into my diet plus I remember how amazing prawns are and they have such a high protein content (good for the #gainz).
We started with the skin prick test. The negative, the histamine and the ingredients (King prawns, Atlantic prawns & scallops) prick. Then they set a timer of 15 minutes. After 15 minutes nothing was happening, no reaction. Result. There were a few more patients doing challenges, and only one nurse, checking on me was delayed, and I didn’t eat the first portion. In that time (5-7minutes or so) the pricks got bigger and bigger. Bigger than the histamine. And I knew that was the end.
I saw the doctor who informed me that if I wanted to continue with the challenge there will be a very high risk that I will have a reaction. There was a higher than negative in my last skin prick and higher than negative on my blood (which wasn’t made clear to me previously, I thought they were low), so I decided that with all of these tests it meant, I am allergic.
I decided not to keep going with the challenge because I had work and didn’t want to stay in hospital to be observed if anything did happen.
This was not the outcome I wanted, but I am happy I tried and hopefully it might over time reduce. I am so grateful with how much I CAN eat and anything extra is a bonus.
An interesting fact that the doctor told me on the day is: if you develop an allergy before puberty you might get rid of it in adulthood but if the allergy develops in adulthood you are extremely less likely to get rid of it.
Plus because I stopped eating prawns at some stage in my life I might have developed the allergy as my body wasn’t used to it post puberty.
I wonder what my reason was that I stopped eating it. I normally don’t stop eating anything unless I am getting reactions (maybe I blocked that out).
Unfortunately, this challenge wasn’t accepted but that does not mean I give up! Science is ever evolving and so am I!
Keep getting tested, keep up your health & gut health, and don’t risk it for the biscuit. (Or in my case, prawns).