Courtesy of Sonya North & Ashley West Photography
It is every parent’s worst nightmare. The phone rings and the person on the other end tells you there has been an incident involving your child, and you should come as quickly as possible.
For Sonya North, this nightmare became reality three years ago when her daughter had an allergic reaction to a snack brought by another parent for a classroom party.
Living with Food Allergies
Photo by Jeffrey S. Hall Photography
Nearly 10 years ago, North’s oldest daughter Khera was diagnosed with allergies to nuts and shellfish. A year later, a whole new set of allergies arrived with North’s infant son, Tommy, after a bad reaction to formula. As Tommy grew, so did his list of allergens. Milk, eggs, beef, soy, strawberries and goat milk are all among the foods he now has to avoid.
“My husband and I don’t have allergies,” says North. “That’s the biggest question that everybody asks me.”
North’s middle daughter, Elle, who she says has been a tremendous help as the family navigates life with food allergies, doesn’t have allergies either. North says she doesn’t know what she would do without Elle, who loves being in the kitchen and can make safe food for the entire family.
“Oftentimes, I will make a couple different meals at dinner time, and Elle will help make Tommy’s food while I’m making the rest,” says North.
Life or Death
When Tommy was 3 years old, North gave him goat milk on a recommendation, and the results were disastrous. She immediately knew something was wrong and took him to their family doctor. By the time they were admitted, his condition was rapidly deteriorating.
“He just slowly started fading away,” says North.
An ambulance was called, an EpiPen administered and he was rushed to the hospital.
“I think by the time we got to the hospital, he started coming back,” says North. “I literally thought he died.”
That was the worst allergic reaction for the family, but not the only one. Two years ago, Khera began reacting to almost everything the family made at home. The culprit: a bad batch of cumin to which the manufacturer had added ground peanuts as a filler.
Three years ago, a seemingly innocent piece of fruit at a classroom party sent her running to the school nurse and resulted in the terrifying call. North believes this was an instance of cross contamination; the fruit was probably prepared on a surface or with a knife that had been in contact with a peanut product.
Paving the Way Through Resistance
The classroom incident brought a renewed strength and passion to North’s advocacy. She began working with Greensview Elementary School nurse Jayna D’Herete to create guidelines to help control the food coming into the classrooms.
“I’ve been advocating for them ever since our diagnosis,” says North. “We kind of created a road map for the entire district on how to safely have food in the classroom.”
A year and a half ago, she started working directly with Upper Arlington City Schools administration to modify the district’s policies on allergies. Resistance from parents who didn’t fully grasp the danger of her children’s allergies challenged North every step of the way.
“My safe list of snacks is different from the next mom’s safe list of snacks,” says North. “If you’re not living the food allergy life, it’s really a game-changer. Nobody believes you that your kid could die because it sounds absurd, but it’s true.”
SnackRoots
Photo courtesy of Sonya North
SnackRoots enables parents to know that their children are safe and that their dietary restrictions are met while snacking with friends outside the home.
North was speaking about being an allergy mom at a meeting when she had the idea for SnackRoots. Several moms, who wanted to help but were frustrated by all the things they couldn’t do, asked if someone could tell them what they could do. North had looked before to find a website or online tool that was easy to use and share, but no such site existed.
North knew she would need help implementing her idea and her search led her to Adam McCrea, whose daughter has celiac disease. Together, they created SnackRoots, a simple webtool that allows parents and teachers to create a quick, online and shareable list of safe snacks.
McCrea played a crucial role in launching the webtool, now allowing North to work and maintain SnackRoots on her own. She is hoping to bring on a computer science intern in the future, though, to help update the app.
My safe list of snacks is different from the next mom’s safe list of snacks. If you’re not living the food allergy life, it’s really a game-changer. Nobody believes you that your kid could die because it sounds absurd, but it’s true.
Users enter a list name, click off the allergies and enter their emails, and a list is created based on whatever combination of allergies is selected. By spring, North plans to implement the technology to enable one person to make the list and allow anyone with whom the list is shared to self-enter their allergies while keeping their identity private.
In addition to the lists, North is also working to upload videos teaching users how to safely prepare snacks, such as fresh fruit. She hopes that, as they generate more users, they will be able to fund a phone application and raise awareness.
SnackRoots is also a useful tool for parents of children with type 1 diabetes as all of the snacks listed on the site have the food labels with carbohydrate information easily accessible.
Children with allergies miss out on a lot, but North hopes SnackRoots will help change that. The business tagline, “Include the child, not the allergen,” is a lesson in having courage to enact change.
“It’s about giving people the tools that they can use to include people they love,” says North.
Do you have a child with allergies?
- Visit www.snackroots.com to access the blog, webtool and other resources.
- A portion of proceeds generated will be donated to End Allergies Together (EAT), an organization committed to funding research to better understand and combat food allergies.
Bianca Wilson is a contributing writer. Feedback welcome at feedback@cityscenemediagroup.com.
