Gratitude, gratitude and a little more gratitude.  I am so full of gratitude this Monday–dark circles under my eyes and all!   The last four days have a been a lovely whirl wind of inspiration, deep thought and food allergy peeps!  I left my house at 4:30am on Thursday and returned home after midnight on Saturday.  The time in between was inspiring, honoring and motivating. I felt the most hope that I ever felt in the last 13 years of raising children with life threatening food allergies.  I attended the small and intimate Mylan Food Allergy Bloggers Summit: Anaphylaxis Class is in Session, in New York City on Friday (see my disclosure below) and was invigorated by the change that is taking place right now regarding research, the development of resources, legislation and the education.

 Dr. Ruchi S. Gupta presenting anaphylaxis–including some startling facts that I’ll blog about this week.

Powerful conversations

What gave me hope were the mind blowing, powerful discussions lead by some of the top food allergy leaders today. Dr. Ruchi Gupta presented information about anaphylaxis, including information about the impact of food allergies, the medical community and so much more (I’m writing specific blogs on some great topics she presented-I took so many notes I thought my fingers would bleed).  Lynda Mitchell, Founder of Kids with Food Allergies and Judy Morgitan, from the National Association of School Nurses, addressed 504 plans and access to epinephrine at school.  They were sheer brilliance!   Again, incredible information was presented that I will share soon! Tonya Winders, Chief Operating Officer for the Allergy and Asthma Network-Mothers of Asthmatics, Liana Burns, representing the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of American and George Dahlman from the Food Allergy Research and Education all presented information  on public policy-complete with legislative updates and highlights of programs that will change the face of the disease and that are carving the path for a cure.  Again, my fingers were flying and I have great data to share from these organizations–some very exciting!  Tonya Winders truly opened my eyes to some fabulous things she is doing too–I’ll report on those as well.

Food Allergy Powerhouses:  Dr. Ruchi S. Gupta, Judy Morgitan, Lynda Mitchell

No matter what question arose that day, there was an expert in the room to offer an answer, quote a statistic or source.  It was as if we had a human library in the room and any food allergy topic was embraced.  The goal of this summit was to bring together a cross section of various food allergy bloggers to provide information and share concerns regarding managing life threatening allergies mostly related to school and give feedback. Can you imagine what happens when a group of food allergy mothers come together? Spirited, enlightened and brilliant conversation!  At one point, I felt as if the summit was morphing into food allergy think tank.  Born from many conversations from our last summit, change had begun with new research ideas and education and many bloggers wrote about new ideas or solutions and resources with hopes of “spreading the word”.

 Note paper, laptops and iPads were all in fully glory as everyone furiously took notes!  Can’t wait to read everyone’s blog posts.

Selfishly, I was thrilled to be with women I had admired for years and to meet up with others that I now consider dear friends.  Even thought we met in NYC, we could have met up in a cave and the energy would have been just as high and as exciting.  There is something magical that takes place when you have a group of people all working towards the same goal with the same incredible amount of passion. I can’t even begin to explain the feeling, but it is very hopeful and empowering.

The group!

Here is the list of the attendees–check out their blogs to read about their perspectives…

[unordered_list style=”star”]

• Cybele Pascal, allergy cook book author and now allergen friendly cookie maven! www.CybelePascal.com
• Elizabeth DiBurro, home school mom extraordinaire and author of Easy Breezy Life
• Heidi Bayer, cool mother of a food allergic teen and author of Bklynallergymom
• Jenny Sprague, Founder of the Food Allergy Bloggers Conference and author of Multiple Food Allergy Help
• Joanne LaSpina, college consultant, food allergy advocate and author of Food Allergy Assistant
• Keeley McGuire, creative lunchbox queen and author of KeeleyMcGuire
• Kelly Rudnicki, allergy cookbook author (she’s been on Martha Stewart!), 504 advocate and author of Food Allergy Mama
• Libby Lison, recipe kind of gal focusing on nut, dairy, egg and red meat recipes at Allergic Kid
• Lindsey Steffenson, great recipes, support on keeping costs downs with food allergies and author of Frugal Food Allergies
• Lisa Rutter, support group leader, really fun person to be around and author of No Nuts Moms Group
• Ruchi S. Gupta, even though the good doctor was a presenter, she is an allergy mom who blogs and wrote a book, Ruchi Gupta
• Ruth Lovett Smith, queen of allergy guides and information and author Best Allergy Sites
• Sloane Miller, Food Allergy Counselor, Food allergy book author and she is simply the Allergic Girl
• Tracy Bush, food allergy consultant, funny and passionate lady and author of Allergy Phoods
• [/unordered_list]

 Food Allergy Counselor and Author, Sloane Miller participated as well and brings a wonderful angle as an adult living with food allergies.

Flying home

All in all, the trip was clearly a huge success and I am completely wiped out. On Sunday, we had a four hour back to school night including a BBQ at my son’s school, so the weekend ended on a high note.  Although, my magnet for freaks on the airplane was in full operation on the return trip home. An old lady sitting two seats over from me, decided to stretch out into the empty seat between us and sleep. At one point, her feet were on the tray next to me and inches away from my tray for several hours as she snored away. Once we landed, I had the job of pulling down and distributing a series of canes and walkers to her and here three friends since she jumped up on her seat in her attempt to reach the over head bins and I was positive she was going to fall and break a hip! Thankfully, on my last leg into Reno, I had changed planes in San Francisco and met a lovely woman traveling from England on her way to Burning Man.  Her sister is a pediatric allergist in England so we had fun discussing food allergies in both countries.

  Sai Cave by Exsodus freedigitalphotos

 I’m honored and full of gratitude to have been included in the summit. Clearly, we have a huge mountain to climb, but I honestly believe our food allergy base camp has been established.

Happy Monday–may today bring you hope too!

Disclosure statement:  I disclose in any communication made by me about EpiPen® (epinephrine) Auto-Injector and/or the Mylan Specialty Blogger Summit that such communications is at my own discretion and based on my own opinion.  I also disclose that my travel expenses were compensated by Mylan Specialty in exchange for evaluation and feedback on information presented during the meeting.