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Day 20-21

As a parent of someone with a life threatening food allergy, I am completely selective about who we spend our time with and the environments we play in. It's not without reason that I am this way because the choices I make affect my child. There's also a lot of ambiguity that follows that decision making. It helps when people are conscientious enough to say they just came from eating pizza, or simply tell us that they washed down before coming to see us. That sort of scenario always plays in a FA Mom's head until the underlying questions are answered with open communication. I'm not very good at letting the elephant just stand in the room. I can turn any conversation into a FA mini-series at the drop of a hat, not fun conversation but definitely warranted at times. It comes with great relief and gratitude when people who aren't having to manage life with food allergies, make a conscious effort for those who are. They recognize that their actions when choosing to be around our family, could cause great detriment to the health of our daughter. These are the people with whom we can spend our time.

This is such a beautiful season of blessings and I know we have a lot of them to count. We have so many people in our lives that are helpful, compassionate, observant, and make grand efforts to be "safe" for our daughter's benefit. We've received non-dairy homemade fudge,  non-dairy Christmas cookies, a magazine subscription to Allergic Living Magazine, and a subscription to Conscious Box-Vegan Edition. Conscious Box is a monthly goody box that offers samples of snacks, beauty product, cleaners, and other household items. This is a great way for us to explore "safe" brands and products that we can use in our home worry-free. People don't realize how difficult it can be to buy sun block, or body lotion, toothpaste, conditioner,  and others miscellaneous non obvious items because all can contain milk proteins. We are thankful to the people who make our road less bumpy and remind us that there is hope to be found in people.  I have a plaque in my house that reads " Where there is great love, there are always miracles." That quote has more than two meanings to me now.

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