It’s been a little over a month since I last posted here, and I wish I could say things are getting better. My anxiety surrounding food and allergies has gotten so bad that I literally can’t eat until my husband gets home, and even then I still really struggle with it. Sometimes I go without eating at all because the anxiety around it is just too much. I am a recovered anorexic and I am very concerned that I will slip back into that because I have been losing weight.
A few weeks ago my husband and I went out to eat with a friend we haven’t seen in a long time to help me get over my anxiety. We used to go out to eat with this friend at least once a month pre-covid, and I never had any issues then. This time I actually was able to eat all of my food and feel okay, but towards the end after I finished eating, I had an itch by my eye and started to panic a little because I started freaking out wondering if I was having an allergic reaction to something.
I can eat something I’ve eaten hundreds of times, and if my face starts itching or I feel like I can’t swallow very well (which isn’t unusual for me), I will start to panic and it will sometimes devolve into a full-on panic attack. I try to talk to myself and convince myself that I’m not going to die and nothing bad will happen, but it seems like I have lost all hope at this point of being able to enjoy food because even if I know logically I am not allergic, it feels like my body and my fight-or-flight response just reacts wether I want it to or not.
I’ve been trying to look at my life and see if anything traumatic has happened recently to spark all of this, but I haven’t been able to think of anything other than COVID, moving to a new house, and just a lot of stressful things going on within my family. All of these things were happening when I first developed this ‘phobia’. The more I try to find answers and use logic to try to get myself out of this, it seems like I just sink back in further. I got an allergy test done with an ENT and while I have elevated igE antibodies for wheat, milk, and egg, they have said it’s not enough that they are concerned about me being allergic to anything, and even if I was, it would be a small reaction, considering I have eaten all of these things my whole life and have never noticed anything out of the ordinary.
Going to that appointment did help for a short time, but I feel like I’m right back to square 1 even though I know its absolutely ridiculous for me to be in the mindset I’m in. I’m on around 10 waitlists for local therapists to see if they can help me figure out why all of a sudden I am so terrified of allergies and allergic reactions, but it’s been nearly 2 months and I haven’t heard back from anyone. I am just truly at a loss for how I can get through this, and I can’t think of anything I want more than to just be able to enjoy a slice of cheesecake or a piece of pizza again.