When you tell friends you can't eat meat, their first thoughts are 'oh, so you're vegetarian now? or are you vegan?' The answer is yes/no and maybe.... Then I tell them it is because I have Alpha Gal allergy and of course they want to know what that is. So, let's start there. Here's a definition from Wikepdia:
You're thinking, HUH?, right? Basically, here it is in a nutshell -- ticks have a form of sugar in their saliva called galactose-alpha-1,3-gallactose. When they bite a person who is sensitive to that sugar, their body goes on the defense and generates an abundance of IGE antibodies ready to fight the problem. What complicates the issue is that sugar is also stored in mammalian meats and it doesn't dissipate with cooking. When an AG allergic person eats meat, the reaction occurs several hours later after consumption because it takes the digestive process that long to break down the meat allowing the offending sugar into the blood stream. Therefore, a person who eats a typical evening meal of meat awakens in the middle night to a horrendous flood of histamines causing a reaction of hives. In extreme cases, even deadly anaphylaxis shock.
The befuddling thing about this allergy is that it is sporadic -- one time a person might eat mammalian meat and be fine, even for weeks, months or years and be fine. But then one day, BOOM, serious reaction. As they learn more about Alpha Gal they gain a better understanding of how it works. Some people get tick bit once and they have symptoms forever afterwards. Some have ebbs and flows with the allergy based on how often they get bitten by ticks. There has even been one reported incidence of a child recovering completely. What a lucky, lucky boy!
The Lone Star Tick in particular is known to cause this allergy but it may not be the only tick since there are cases reported in places in the United States and abroad where the Lone Star Tick isn't a native resident. Considering Lymes Disease and Rocky Mountain Fever caused by ticks and now Alpha Gal, I would say, no tick is a good tick.
Being bit by a tick and contracting Alpha Gal allergy is truly a case of once bitten, twice shy.
You will see it often called the *red meat* allergy but that's a bit of a misnomer, because it also includes pork which people commonly think of as the *other white meat* due to great marketing strategies by the Pork Producers competing with the poultry industry. The more accurate term is *mammalian meat* allergy with mammals being any animal that nurses it's young. I once thought I could describe it as hoofed animals because it includes beef, sheep, pork, goat, buffalo, venison, big game, etc. But it is important to know that it also includes rabbits and squirrels which don't have hoofs. Horse would also be included but as an American, I don't think of horses as meat but in case someone out there lives in places where they do, they are mammals as are cats and dogs.
So, if mammals are off the table, what does that leave? Everything else! There is all manner of plant based proteins and yummy ways to prepare them, such as beans and legumes which readily come to mind. But let's not forget to talk about the actual meat sources that do remain on the list as edible options - chicken, turkey, fowl, fish and seafood. While it might seem like a small list, it is actually quite a lot. And a particularly awesome meat AGers can have? Emu! Which I'm told looks, cooks and eats just like beef! I have read raving reviews that people have served it to others and they couldn't tell the difference between it and beef. I am anxious to try it. In fact, I've found a listing for an Emu farm about 2 hours from me, so I have tentative plans to go there the next available Saturday. I will be sure to do a post or two on that adventure and maybe even some videos.
This is just the tip of the ice burg of what Alpha Gal is. Every individual stricken by it has a unique set of symptoms and reactions and sometimes complicated by additional unrelated allergies. Or perhaps they are related and there just isn't sufficient research yet to link them.... Some AG sufferers can eat dairy and some violently react to it. Some can have pork and those lucky dogs continue to gnosh on bacon while I can only dream of my bacon days gone by. And as if all that isn't complex enough, there is something called *pork/cat syndrome* which isn't truly Alpha Gal but it is equally unpleasant for those afflicted.
What is a person to do if diagnosed with Alpha Gal? Take a deep breath, educate yourself, make adjustments and know that there is most definitely a high quality life awaiting you after your Alpha Gal diagnosis. You just have to get through it to get to it. Or, as my Daddy said when he was alive, *keep on keeping on*.
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