Oh Dear, Preschool Mom Needs Help!

[jayhawkmom]

My daughter is 5 and due to start Kindergarten. She's TEENY tiny, barely (and FINALLY) in the 8th percentile. However, since her dx and the start of a gluten-free diet, she's starting to grow!!! And, we are finding other allergies/intolerances along the way.

We chatted with her pediatrician, and together with him - my husband and I decided to hold her back this year, and start K next year. She'll do a year of preschool this year, instead.

Here's my problem.....

It's a Co-Op preschool. That means that every class time, there is a parent in the classroom for the duration. And, the snack for the day is chosen and brought by that volunteering parent. There is no WAY for me to learn, in advance, what snacks will be brought to the classroom.

What in the world do I do??

My daughter can't have gluten, obviously, but she can't have nuts, eggs, or dairy products either. I'm now terrified that once I walk into the office with all our registration papers, that the director is going to laugh me right out the door. Help!

[VydorScope]

We send our child in with a bag off food that he likes. And tell the teachers that he can only eat/drink fromhis bag and educated them on cleaning his hands/table/etc if they come in contact with another sutdents food. We do not make any attempt to educate tehm about what foods are safe, we just provide them with the safe food.

[Guest nini]

I provided my daughter's preschool with all her safe foods, she was only allowed to eat foods from the safe supply that I provided.

For school, I send her own lunches and provide her own snacks. She is only allowed to eat snacks that are brought in IF they are on a pre approved list.

My advice to you would be to do like Vincent does (Vydorscope) and provide a bag of safe food everyday and instruct them that she is ONLY to have food from her bag and nothing else. And that whoever is in the room is to be instructed about cross contamination and making sure that none of the other kids try to feed her or she doesn't try to swipe food from another child. (we had ONE incident where another child offered my daughter an oreo and she had ONE bite before the teacher caught it and freaked. My daughter hasn't done anything since because she got so sick from that one bite she hasn't been tempted again)

[Nic]

My son's preschool provided snack for the students. It was usually crackers, cereal, or cookies. I would keep a bag of gluten free animal crackers and a box of cereal at school. When they had crackers or cookies, he ate his. When they ate cereal, he had his. I only asked the school in advance to please give me a warning before any special celebration so that I could bring in a matching treat. If you ask the teacher to inform the other parents I am sure the will cooperate with giving advanced notice.

nicole

[lbsteenwyk]

My 4 1/2 yr old takes takes her own snack every day. We attend a preschool in which all the children provide their own lunch and there is a no food sharing policy; so that works out well. They do provide snack, however, and it's almost always gluten. We always bring our own, even if the school snack does not contain gluten. The coop arrangement makes your situation a little more challenging.

I would enlist the help of the director in finding out the best ways to keep your daughter safe at school. Is there a way that you can communicate with the parent of the day? Is there a regular teacher that is assigned to the room as well who could be sure your daughter's needs are met? I would take lots of time to impress on the director of the program the need to keep your daughter healthy. If she acts as though this is going to be difficult, you may want to look for a different preschool.

The other thing I would do is work with your daughter to be responsible for her own snack. At 5 she should certainly be able to understand the concept of not eating gluten. If she's had some bad reactions, she may be quite motivated to stay away from it! Let her choose and pack her snack each day (from 2 or 3 choices that you provide). You could buy some colorful plastic containers and put stickers and her name on them to personalize the whole process. Impress upon her the need to only eat food that you provide. My daughter actually prefers her own snack; I've never had any difficulty with her wanting other kid's food at school or feeling left out. You may want to keep a bag or "special treats" such as cookies or cupcakes at school in case the need for a substitute arises.

[lorka150]

you might be surprised - speak with the director, providing them with a plethora of easy information. from snacks to reactions to that your child cannot paint pasta .

i am sure they have been hit with this a million times, unless they are brand new. i still speak to my pre-school teacher, and when i was diagnosed, she was very familiar with it and said it was common and she generally had one a year in her classes.

good luck.

[jayhawkmom]

If you ask the teacher to inform the other parents I am sure the will cooperate with giving advanced notice.

Thank you for all the replies.

Nic - the problem is that each and every single class there will be a different parent, and a different snack. I can probably get a list of what parent has what day, but I'm sure I'll encounter parents who will say, "Well, we don't know what we are taking for a snack yet" and that will certainly cause issues.

When I mentioned to the director that she had dietary issues, she asked if she had food allergies. I said yes, because she does.... peanuts, eggs, wheat, dairy...etc. When I mentioned wheat, she asked me if she had Celiac Sprue. Technically, she doesn't - but she is gluten intolerant, so I just said, "yes, she does." I figured... she obviously is familiar with it - why the need to differentiate?

So, it might not be *that* bad. But, I'm trying to prepare myself for the worst.

And, absolutely.... if I feel that they dont' "get it" and if I feel that my daughter is in harms way in any form... I will not hesitate to pull her out of the preschool!

She is 5, but she's a very very immature 5. She has a LOT of catching up to do over the next year or so. She's sooooo tiny. And, so hyper - but it's getting better. Slowly, but surely!!!

[2kids4me]

my kids were diagnosed when they were older but I have never had a problem with teachers - or the other kids if their snack was different. They were more curious than anything and after a few days, it was just the way it was - no big deal.

I would send her favorite sancks that she likes - have her pick what she wants for the day. The other kids - if they notice, can be told she has food allergies ( a surprising number of kids in preschool know what that means).

My son with his diabetes/celiac, he not only needs to eat at specific times (and sometimes its during class time) but he has to eat gluten-free and test his blood glucose.

An idea might be to compose a letter and see if the preschool could circulate it to parents - like:

One of the children at school this year has serious food allergies, please know in advance this child will provide her own snack so parents do not have to worry about what they choose for snack for the rest of the class. if you have any questions or your chidlren want to why one child brings their snack - please feel free to call.

or something like that... ??

a good link is right here on celiac.com -

https://www.celiac.com/st_prod.html?p_prodi...-41106011898.4f

[katecopsey]

I will second the idea of speaking to the preschool director and teacher. They will have a list of parents who will provide the snack and can easily whip a letter off to all the parents that your child cannot eat gluten (and some examples). It is perhaps unrealistic to expect the parents to bring a special snack for your child, so providing one beforehand works well and the parents have the heads-up that one child will not be eating the cupcake.

Most people are now sensitized to the violent/deadly effect that peanuts have on someone and they unknowingly sometimes think that gluten will do the same. So you bet they will take any serious 'allergy' will all the care they need. And yes, celiac is not an allergy per se, but it is easier to explain it that way in general conversation sometimes.

[Cheri A]

I would send in her snack every day and make sure that they have a good policy in place for cleaning the snack tables, hands etc.

Depending on how sensitive she is, I would ask for a letter to go home to the parents about the allergies. Some people *will* get it, others won't. But that, at least, gives them a heads-up.

[Esther Sparhawk]

Like some of the other parents who responded, my preschooler just got used to having a different treat than all of the other kids. She never complained. She just accepted.

Be wary of a mistake I made once, though. At our preschool, parents provide snacks periodically. Once I made a huge batch of gluten-free sugar cookies. I didn't think Annie would ever get through all of them, so I took some to preschool for our snack day.

Bad idea! The other kids all said "Oooh! Icky!" and that made Annie feel bad. I won't ever do that again! I'll just bring supermarket cookies for the other kids from now on.

Mechelle

[Guest nini]

did you make a big deal about the sugar cookies being gluten-free? When I took homemade cupcakes, cake or cookies to my daughters pre school or kindergarten, I didn't tell them it was different. The teacher knew that what I brought was safe for my daughter, but she didn't make a big deal about letting the other kids know that. And they all LOVED the homemade goodies. I have run into issues with my own nephew where I've tried to offer him something that my daughter was eating and as soon as he found out it was gluten-free, he said "oooooh yucky" but I betcha if he didn't know it was any different he wouldn't have cared. In fact when my one sister in law was in town recently, she made a special gluten-free devils food cake and we had my sister and her kids over... no one told the kids that the cake was gluten-free, and they gobbled it all up, even wanted seconds.

My point is, most times kids will say "ooooh yuck" if something is perceived different, not because it's really yucky. So don't give up based on that one experience!

Oh, there was a time around Christmas at the preschool where the class project was to make sugar cookies and decorate them. I provided the teacher with the pre made dough for the whole class and extra rice flour to dust the tables with and gluten-free decorations and frostings... the kids had a ball, gobbled up all the sugar cookies that they made and no one had a clue that they were gluten-free except for the teacher and my daughter, who got to feel like a co conspirator with the teacher! (I used the gluten-free Pantry's Old Fashioned Cake and Cookie mix)

[Nic]

I agree with Nini. When my son first got diagnosed my nephews and my niece would not touch his food. The mac and cheese looked different so there fore must be yucky. Now they beg to have his food when there may not be enough to share and feel bad they can't have it. So now I always pack enough gluten-free treats so he can share with his cousins.

Nicole

[Esther Sparhawk]

did you make a big deal about the sugar cookies being gluten-free?

My point is, most times kids will say "ooooh yuck" if something is perceived different, not because it's really yucky. So don't give up based on that one experience!

Like you, I only told the teacher. But these cookies were made from scratch, not a mix. That was my mistake. My adaptation to my grandma's cookie recipe probably used too much rice flour, because the cookies turned out tasting a lot like a fortune cookie -- and they were crunchy like that too.

Where I live, in the rural west, we have one small health food store 30 miles away. They have a few of the gluten-free bread mixes, but they don't carry the cookie mixes. The next closest health food store is more than a hundred miles away, so we only go there once every four months or so.

When the holidays get closer, maybe I'll either travel afar (like the wise men) or order a mix online. That way I won't have to give up on the gluten-free cookies for Annie's whole class. I love the idea of providing the preschoolers with a whole batch of gluten-free dough, decorations and frosting! Our preschool also decorates holiday sugar cookies, and last time, even though I attended the event and kept Annie out of the wheat flour and wheat cookies (providing gluten-free cookies and flour for her alone), there was enough residual wheat flour everywhere to make her sick. Thanks for the tip on that!

Mechelle

[Guest nini]

I would highly recommend ordering the mixes from the Gluten Free Pantry, they are awesome! I haven't had a single mix of theirs not turn out. I also love 1-2-3 Gluten Free mixes... Kinnickinick also has some good mixes, and I LOVE Namaste's spice cake mix (with the optional carrot cake recipe!)

[Esther Sparhawk]

I would highly recommend ordering the mixes from the Gluten Free Pantry, they are awesome! I haven't had a single mix of theirs not turn out. I also love 1-2-3 Gluten Free mixes... Kinnickinick also has some good mixes, and I LOVE Namaste's spice cake mix (with the optional carrot cake recipe!)

Okay, thanks a lot for the advice!

Mechelle