The Chronicles Of Nay

Happy Monday! I hope that everyone had a good weekend! Most of you know that I have been working on a masters degree in Science Education. I got a bunch of information about graduation last week. I got information like here to get my cap and gown and stuff. That is pretty exciting! I will be graduating in May. I didn’t realize how much I would like grad school. So, now that it is coming to an end, I applied for the PhD program. I found out last week, that I have been accepted in to the TCU Science Ed PhD program! I am super excited, nervous but excited! We can talk about all those feelings another time!

So a quick funny story before we get to why we are here. So I have a kid let’s call him Aiden, that is a challenge in my 7th period. He is smart but he is also way too talkative and doesn’t apply himself. When I ask him to stop talking or to turn around and work he says I am working or I wasn’t even talking with that annoying lip smack thing. So last week I was like hey how do you get home? He said My dad comes to get me. I said cool! So I usually dismiss the kids by shoe color or by table so that they go out slowly. Well his table was the last to leave and I told them I hadn’t forgot about them I was just gathering my things but I want to walk out with Aiden so to be patient. He said WHY?!?! I told him I wanted to talk to his dad about his classroom behavior. So I dismiss them and he tried real hard to get away from me.

Ok here is a diagram. The grey is road and the driveway/sidewalk area at the school, the yellow is his adults car, the purple my classroom, the blue is buildings and the red is our path. When we got up to about where the yellow rectangle is he made the decision to turn right and pretend he didn’t see her. We continued as she walked behind us honking trying to get his attention. He was a fast little booger too! When we finally got to grandma’s car I was short of breath and trying to tell her in spanish the problem we had in class today. He really thought if he made me walk around the world that I was just going to be like “welp this isn’t worth it!” I mean it was much more of a work out than I was prepared for! My watch said that I had done a 10 minute workout after! Don’t worry his behavior the res of the week was not any better and he turned in 0 more assignments after I talked to his adult. So that 10 minute chase was well worth it….

Ok so the reason for blog. Can we talk about food allergies for a moment. First and foremost, It is not a choice. I (or others with food allergies) did not choose this life, the allergy life chose me (us)! I find myself apologizing to people when I ask a clarification or for the ingredients. I promise you, it is a bigger pain in my butt than it is in yours. I know I shouldn’t have to apologize, but I do because I feel like I’m an inconvenience! I appreciate anytime anyone offers me food, I do understand that you often don’t think about what is in it. I am not offended, I promise, just understand why I turn it down! Don’t worry, my mom forgets too and I never question her love for me! haha

I was talking with a friend about it and we decided part of the problem people have is that the way people react to their allergens is as diverse as we are as people. I personally just get itchy, my tongue, my throat sometimes the inside of my ears when I eat tree nuts or edamame. I have a friend who’s kid once got sick because he walked into a room where they had done an acorn activity earlier in the day. Also since people react so differently people assume that I am lying or my allergy is less important than my friends son.

Also cross contamination is a thing. Again my friends kid got sick because his muffin was sitting next to a banana nut muffin. Also using the same utensils to cut or stir or spread. For instance f you you spread peanut butter with a knife then you put the knife in the jelly, the jelly now has peanut butter germs. I personally am allergic to tree nuts, not peanuts but the example is still real.

I personally don’t want anyone to change what they eat or how they cook. All I ask is could we get some labels on things when we do potlucks. Even a name of what it is would be helpful. I know the simple solution is that I don’t participate, but… Do you know me!?!?! I am like the little mermaid 🎶I wanna be… where the people are🎶.

I didn’t become aware of my food allergy until I was in high school. The first interaction I ever had with food allergies was when I was coaching tennis in a summer program in high school. a mom had brought popsicles to the group and I gave this big spiel about not being ungrateful and make sure to thank the mom and no one is going to be asking me for a certain flavor! I hand them out and a little kid comes up to me and hands me a green popsicle and asked if he could have a red one. I started in with “we had this conversation… blah blah blah” and when I finished he said “Well I am allergic to yellow dye number 5, but if I can’t get a red one here is this green one back.” I was like “omg yes here what do you need” and I fanned out the popsicles I had in my hand like I was doing a card trick. Poor kid! I didn’t even know someone could be allergic to a color!

So to recap, food allergies are a thing, It is ok to ask questions, cross contamination is a thing, we aren’t asking to be a pain, I don’t need you to change anything just inform when you are cooking.

Well I really should get some homework done, or take a nap! haha I hope that everyone has a great week!!!