believe me when I say I get the frustration of people who say they’re gluten free ordering things that contain gluten and not caring, but I will always always always assume someone who orders gluten free is being deadly serious. if I’m wrong, the worst thing I’ve done is wasted a bit of my time; if I assume they aren’t serious and they are, then I’ve increased a stranger’s risk of colon cancer
“I bet they’re not even allergic to nuts!”
oh gee would i rather have the petty joy of proving a stranger ‘wrong’ or risk sending somebody into fucking anaphylaxis? it’s not hard folks
You should also do this for folks who say they’re vegan– egg and dairy allergies are some of the most common allergies and if you have both like me, the easiest way to find food to eat is look for stuff labeled vegan. Don’t be a shithead and slip eggs or dairy into something vegan (looking at you, baristas who think it’s hilarious to put regular cream instead of almond milk because you think almond milk is “pretentious”) because you never know if there’s a significant health reason behind being vegan. Also you shouldn’t do it anyway because you should like, actually respect people’s ability to choose what foods they eat, but yeah. Don’t lie about what you’re putting in food. I’ve had too many allergic reactions because of this.
also even if someone is vegan and DOESN’T have an allergy to dairy/eggs etc still DONT “TRICK” THEM INTO EATING MEAT OR DAIRY. If you haven’t eaten these things in a long time your body does not know how to process it anymore and will get very very VERY sick if you suddenly like eat beef or cheese. I’m talking hours on the toilet, or puking, etc. Just fucking respect people’s food choices also literally what does it matter to you.
A lot of allergies present in ways that aren’t immediately obvious to an onlooker. It’s not always instant anaphylaxis. Sometimes it’s vomiting later on or intense intestinal pain later that evening, or sub-dermal hives.
With some types of food allergies and food sensitivities, sometimes a little bit of something, on a good day, if someone’s body has otherwise been cooperating. People know their own bodies best, and can make their own choices and decide whether or not they feel okay risking it.
As a society, people need to be better about accepting “I can’t eat this” means “I can’t eat this”. No means no, even if it applies to food.
Yes, even if you think they secretly just don’t like it. So what? Stop trying to make people eat food they don’t want. They’re PROBABLY not lying - most people with serious allergies have dozens of stories of people saying “Oh, I just thought you didn’t LIKE it, I didn’t realize you were REALLY allergic” despite being told that.
But consider that if someone honestly felt that they needed to lie in order to not eat the food that tastes bad or has a Bad Texture to them, consider how many times they tried to say “Does it have X in it? I don’t like X” and had that disrespected or invalidated or mocked.
Don’t be a dick.
My usual allergy symptoms include having the shits for the next week, getting super itchy rashes that take a good month to heal and, if it gets bad enough and builds up, inflammations. Now, for me that usually presents similar to pollen allergy symptoms or like a fake cold/flu.
For my mom, who’s been living with these allergies for far longer and has worse reactions, it’s asthmatic-presenting reactions that you can’t fix with asthma spray because the source is different. There’s been four times where we weren’t sure she’d survive because she couldn’t breathe and there’s nothing we could do to help. We still haven’t found any short-term aids that worked either, and we’ve been looking.
These reactions don’t happen immediately because our allergies are classified as sensitivities: it’s a slow build-up of allergens until it crosses the threshold and our bodies react.
This means I can choose to make exceptions sometimes - but I also know at what threshold level I’m currently at, something an outsider cannot fucking perceive. Don’t take that choice away from me just because you want to feel ~righteous about something as trivial as another person’s spending choices.
