We plan to present each family with a butter spread made from sunflower seeds, a nice letter explaining peanut allergy, and a list of recipes for sunbutter cookies and snacks.  Hopefully this will help get them on our side.

I'm sorry you have to deal with snideness but I think every time you have a conversation like the one you described, you'll earn an ally.  And giving people food always seems to work :-)

I guess it varies from place to place.  At my son's preschool we were told there was a child in the class with a severe peanut allergy.  I don't remember anyone ever saying a word or exchanging a look about it.  You have a vulnerable child, you protect him.  Period.  

Maybe it was easier for us because it was half-day and the kids didn't bring lunches with them, so parents whose kids would only eat PB&J weren't inconvenienced.  Everyone seemed to find a way around peanuts in the snacks they sent.  My kid has never particularly liked peanuts or peanut butter so maybe is was harder for some people and I just wasn't aware of it.

by educating  others' thereby eliminating or diminishing unrealistic reactions of shallow ignorance.  

It is interesting to note that when children are educated about these issues, they are respective and desirous of wanting to support and help their fellow students.  It amazes and discourages me that it is the adults that cause the lack of empathy which then trickles down and ultimately pollutes their's and other children's thinking and actions.

I wish you good luck in your endeavors for positive change and I admire your efforts.  Peanut allergies are very serious and as you point out can be life-threatening.

shannon,is this safe?  I ask because for the first time since my kids started attending their pre school, one of my sons has classmates with peanut allergy and we've gone peanut free for his lunches.  I thought about other nut butter spreads but was a little worried about whether they were safe if they were perhaps manufactured in a plant where peanut butter was made.

We have familiarity with the severity of this allergy because our best friends' son has it and I had a roommate after college who had it as well, so I had absolutely no qualms about finding something else to pack for him. For the past two weeks, I've made him homemade pizza and sent a slice in, and this week he requested chicken nuggets (though he doesn't know he's getting vegan nuggets because the real chicken ones have twice as much fat).

with this.  While not having allergies, I can relate to the rolling of the eyes one receives when asking for what many consider "special treatment" due to medical conditions.  It always amazes me that there's people out there who really seem to prefer to believe that people just make this stuff up....hiring the nurse is a great idea.  Sad that its necessary and that your word alone doesn't go far enough, but you can't fight all the battles all the time.

you might think about doing is to send a letter to the parents in the room. My DS just attended a summer camp/preschool and there was a child with a peanut allergy. The parents of the girl sent a letter to all of the parents explaining why it is so serious and most helpfully, giving a list of foods that are safe. They also gave their number for people to call them if they had a question about a food (such as sunbutter above) and they also listed snacks that are safe for their daughter if parents wanted to bring something for everyone (for a bday). But also they kept a stash of safe snacks at the school and told people not to worry about their kid if they want to send something else. I thought it was helpful to have a list of foods that i could pack for lunch that wouldn't cause a reaction in her child. i didn't have to guess and I didn't have to worry about it.

and how proactive you were in hiring the nurse. I'm glad the school was so responsive, and hope that through education, the unconvinced parents will make the connection.

This is another reason why I'm glad that my daughter's daycare has its own kitchen; the director explained to me that because they have a few children who fall into the major allergy camps (nuts, dairy and egg), they just cook entirely without all of them for everybody. If there's a birthday party, the parents must bring something without the above ingredients - center rule. As Jess has the egg allergy, it was a source of tremendous comfort for me.

the last time something here was posted about Peanut allergies- her opinion was similar to what you experienced- eye rolls and an insistence that if a child was "so allergic" to something, they should just have to make due with sitting at a different lunch table and avoiding contact with other kids. She was so strange about it, indignant at the idea that someone could have told her that her kids would have to avoid peanut butter at school. After trying to be factual I finally just said "well thank god (DD) isn't allergic to anything like that. I'd hate to ask you to avoid it, I guess. But I tell you this mom, if some other parent insisted on doing something that endangered my child? There would be hell to pay." She kind of backed off, when I framed it as a "what if it were YOUR grandchild?" but seriously. What if it WERE your kid people, would you respect people who treated you like you were overly paranoid?

Good luck with everything progressiveinky!

My son is also peanut allergic and will be starting pre K this year.  The program is a half day pre-K so there will be no meals served.  However, we will be dealing with birthday parties etc.  My plan is to try to volunteer and become a room mother if they still have them and be there to help out for the parties so that I am aware of any contamination issues.  Also I have a stash of safe cupcakes that I have baked myself in the freezer.

Looking at your solutions though I am very impressed and also I confess a little intimidated.  I think that I am in a more enlightened area regarding food allergies although it's likely there will always be some eye rollers and people who just won't get it unless it happens in their family.  That said, you have taken on a lot of personal financial cost in dealing with this. I'm positive that my family would not be able to hire a nurse for the school or even provide a jar of Sunbutter at $4.50 a pop around here anyway for all of my son's classmates.  It makes me wonder what someone who doesn't have the option of paying for this or volunteering at the school would be able to do to ensure his or her child's safety.  I also wonder if this is a problem that goes unrecognized in poorer urban schools.  

When I taught at the Catholic school with mostly middle class kids we teachers seemed to have an ever growing list of students with identified allergies and epis and procedures for dealing with it in the room.  I received no such information while I worked in an underprivileged urban after school program.  I find it hard to believe that none of the kids I worked with there had food allergies and always suspected that they faced a lot of risk in that environment.  I think like all aspects of health care there is an economic injustice attached to the food allergic child in that kind of setting.

It's really not as much money as it sounds.  Even the nurse wasn't that expensive and there are free resources available for medical training through the school/childcare licensure board in most states.  As for the sunbutter, if you are buying for a school or in bulk you can order directly from the manufacturer at a reduced rate.  I am very grateful that we are able to afford such resources and that the school is willing to work with us.  The school staff are also very grateful for 1) the free training that counts toward their CE credit 2) help dealing with uninformed parents.  Plus we'll definitely be involved through volunteer activities just to be sure everything is going well. I also often wonder what happens in families where there is a lack of understanding or means.  For example, my step-sister would just take the school's word for it that they would watch out for it and she would just shrug it off if her child ended up in the ER.  She's not as neurotic as me but I just cannot have any peace of mind unless we've done everything we need to do to make sure he's safe.