Today’s podcast is with Simone Albert, counsellor, author and speaker in the food allergy space.

We explore her family’s personal journey of living with a life-threatening food allergy after her youngest son’s frightening experience and diagnosis shortly before seven months of age.

Already a registered nurse, Simone decided to pursue counselling due to the lack of support and awareness of the mental health aspect surrounding an allergy diagnosis and the impact this has on life for the individual and family.

Simone is a recognised leader and advocate in the allergy support space and has spoken at many events to raise awareness of living with allergies.

In today’s conversation we also discuss some of the possible reasons behind the rising prevalence of food allergies.

Most recently Simone has written her first book ‘Beyond the Allergy Diagnosis: A Guide to Understanding and Navigating the Emotional and Psychological Phases of Allergies’. Simone discusses how she wrote the book centred around the 8 phases of an allergy journey and how the book is written to provide practical tools and support to individuals and families.

We enjoyed today's chat with the warm and passionate Simone Albert. And we hope you do too.

For the full list of show notes go to our website Healthier Homes and Living.COM.AU

Join us for a chat about:

• How Sim’s family journey began with life threatening allergies
• Sim’s personal experience as a mum
• The difficulty in starting school with a chronic condition such as allergies
• The necessity of schools to be supportive but also recognise the individuality of each child and case
• Some of the challenges Sim’s son faced and felt
• Some reflections from hindsight
• Some possible theories for the rise in allergies
• The psychological and mental health aspect of allergy diagnosis
• Sim’s passion to be preventative in our mental health
• What you can do to support someone you know with allergies and what not to do or say
• How it is important to extend invitations to children with allergies
• The deliberate organisation of the book through phases
• Why Sim encourages journaling
• How we can start to train our mind to think positively
• Some tips for a family experiencing a NEW allergy diagnosis