Hi Wyndie!
I am sooo sorry I haven't answered sooner. I was scheduled for surgery and then
got very sick, and haven't really been on the computer much. Just so everyone
knows, my Yahoo account is linked to an email account that has problems. It
makes accessing Yahoo difficult, and when I'm in bed I work mainly off my work
BlackBerry, which doesn't interface well with Yahoo and not at all with that
email address. One of these days, when I'm not cooking or hiring help for my kid
or fighting the school district (my new "hobby" you could say), I will get it
all sorted out. Meanwhile, I'm just not going to be able to keep up my moderator
duties very well, and I sincerely apologize.

Now, your mom. Wow! How in the world did she figure out she was anaphylactic to
corn? That's a pretty tough one. We have managed to avoid corn by just cooking
all foods from scratch, except for a few things like Knudsen's Just Juice
without citric or ascorbic acid, or pure rice crackers. Fortunately my manic
diligence to avoid corn 100% has paid off -we just got back fresh allergy tests
showing Tom no longer is allergic (IgE) or intolerant (IgG) to corn. Yippee! But
we won't declare success til I challenge it for a week to make sure he won't
re-sensitize.

Besides eating whole, fresh-cooked foods, your mom will have to seek out a whole
new set of vitamins and supplements, most likely. I have never found a
multivitamin that doesn't contain corn, we had to build up Tom's vitamin regimen
one item at a time. He takes a ton of pills, just to avoid combined supplements
that would have something derived from corn. Vitamin C is the worst offender,
it's almost always from corn. Twinlabs makes a corn-free C, and so does
Nutricology. If your mom is allergic to environmental sources, like Tom is,
shell also have to watch out for corn in plastic packaging and paper products.
Corn can be found in everything from carpet to toilet paper. Not everyone reacts
to those inert forms of corn, but she should at least consider those when trying
to track down unexplained reactions. Cleaning products, especially airborne
things like sprays and powders, should also be considered, as well as topical
creams and cosmetics. Corn truly is everywhere and it's pretty tough to avoid.

We have our corn-avoidance regimen down pretty well at this point, and so that
means I've really lost touch over the years to the places I first learned about
corn avoidance. There used to be some excellent corn allergy websites, but I'm
afraid I haven't kept up with them, so a Google search would probably yield some
new sites for help.

Since this is an IgE allergy, your mom should get a good allergist. Shell need
to be prepared for any medical treatments, like medications and treatments in
the future. She should of course have an Epi Pen, and probably a medic Alert
bracelet warning of the problem so emergency eraponders don't, for instance,
deliver a dextrose IV. She'll also need to start using a compounding pharmacy so
she can have her meds made up in corn-free formulations. We've had benadryl
compunded for years in creams and capsules.

I sure wish I had an easy answer for this one. My heart goes out to your mom.
Corn is about the toughest allergen there is to avoid, and anaphylaxis makes it
essential to not make mistakes. Please let me know if there are any particular
vitamin items she needs, I can probably suggest brands and formulations.

All the best to her as she works to figure this out.

Suzanne

-- In foodallergyautism@yahoogroups.com, "Wyndie" <mileski5@...> wrote:
>
> I know you're busy but I need your help if you have a minute. We
> recently discovered my mother has an anaphylactic allergy to corn.
> She's doing well avoiding it in food but is finding it in all her
> supplements - even benadryl! We can't find a good vitamin that
> doesn't contain it and I know you've been thru this horrible road
> before. Do you have a good vitamin recommendation? She's on multiple
> supplements as she's trying to detox and is finding it hard to
> function without some of her things. We're also really struggling to
> find something to use for severe reactions as the stuff we use in our
> house just doesn't work for her. Any suggestion are appreciated.
>
> Wyndie
>