Áilín Quinlan: I never knew I had a nut allergy - then I bit into a chocolate...
A passenger on board had a serious peanut allergy and she urged the rest of us not to either eat peanuts or products containing peanuts, or unwrap bags or packets of peanuts or things containing peanuts.
“Oh, for God’s sake,” I grumbled, returning the bar to its three separate layers of wrapping (I told you it was posh) and stowing it in the backpack under the seat in front of me. I’d really been looking forward to munching on that nougat.
But the universe was watching. Despite the fact that I’d immediately rewrapped the nougat and put it away, the universe judged me to be lacking in empathy. And the universe decided to teach me a lesson.
Ten days later, a friend arrived at mine for dinner and to stay the night, carrying a bottle of good wine and an elegant, clearly expensive, glass jar of gold-covered chocolate hazelnuts. The gold coating on the nuts matched both the gilded lid of the jar and the gold bow which adorned it.
“So this,” I commented delightedly, “is how the other half lives!”
After dinner, we washed up, then settled back with the jar of gold-covered nuts between us to watch a film.
Within minutes of eating a few of the nuts, I felt nauseous.
Then I was on the floor, pole-axed, my skin cold and clammy. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t speak.
My terrified friend knelt beside me, begging me to say what was wrong. I was unable to move my jaw to answer her.
After trying unsuccessfully to get me up, she put a pillow under my head and covered me with a warm throw.
More time passed. Then the severe nausea I was experiencing suddenly went nuclear. I made it as far as the loo and threw up three times before collapsing back on the floor. My friend eventually got me into bed.
I slept for a solid two hours, then staggered downstairs.
My friend suffered no ill effects whatsoever.
I couldn’t believe how I’d reacted to eating no more than a couple of nuts. I eat small quantities of nuts quite regularly and they’ve never made me ill before.
We googled it. Symptoms of a hazelnut allergy, it seems, can include everything from mild itching or hives to severe life-threatening anaphylaxis which can appear within minutes or up to two hours after you eat the nut.
What? I thought anaphylaxis is mostly caused by bee stings!
With anaphylaxis, my friend read aloud, the tongue, the face, and the lips can swell, the throat can feel scratchy and the mouth itchy. There can be difficulty swallowing. There can be wheezing, chest tightness, hives, low blood pressure (as in dizziness or fainting).
“Nope,” I said, mightily relieved, “There was none of that.”
“Hang on,” my friend said, continuing to read. “There can be a rapid or weak pulse.”
“No again”, I said.
“What about light-headedness, dizziness, fainting.”
Nope.
“What about cold, clammy skin?”
Well, yes, I said reluctantly, there had been a lot of cold sweat.
“There can also be nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea and severe stomach cramps.”
I’d had nausea and vomiting.
“But,” I argued, “I’ve eaten nuts all my life and I’ve never had a problem.”
We googled some more.
Yes, Google informed us, you can eat nuts all your life without any problem and then suddenly develop an allergic reaction to them.
In fact, food allergies can start and stop at any time during your life, which means that you can become sensitized to a food you’ve previously tolerated for years.
This can be caused by different factors - changes in your immune system, for example, or suddenly deciding to eat something you haven’t eaten in a long time.
Although food allergies are usually diagnosed in childhood, adult-onset food allergies, I learned to my surprise, are fairly common. They can come on at any age.
The most common adult-onset food allergies are fish and shellfish, peanuts and tree nuts, which include almonds, walnuts, pecans, cashew, and of course, hazelnuts.
And, believe it or not, adult-onset allergies happen more often among women.
On the other hand, could the reaction have been to whatever was in that lovely gold coating on the nuts?
We looked at the label which listed the ingredients used in the coating. Sugar, rice starch, thickening (gum Arabic), maltodextrin (a highly processed carbohydrate used in many processed foods), flavourings, gelatin.
Colouring: E174, which I read, is an approved food additive, often used as a colourant to impart a metallic silver grey sheen to confectionery chocolates, and liqueurs.
Ah here, I thought to myself, honest to God, we truly don’t have a notion.
“The advice is that you should not ignore a new reaction to a food you’ve eaten,” my friend read.
“See the GP if you experience negative symptoms after eating something.
“You’d better make an appointment,” she said.
“You might have to carry an EpiPen.”
God, I thought ungratefully, that’s all I need.
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