Mom Demands School Go Peanut-Free For Allergic Child

[Aristus]

268. I didn't say it didn't exist. I simply suspect it is overdiagnosed.

I see this sort of thing all the time. Women presenting to the clinic insisting they have fibromyalgia, for example, which was the fad disease of choice around ten years ago or so, but exhibiting none of the classic symptoms, and reporting a history inconsistent with fibromyalgia.

Now there is a fairly broad differential here. Arthritis, polymyalgia rheumatica, ankylosing spondylitis, chronic fatigue, thyroid abnormalities, etc. But they would insist that they had fibromyalgia. It became part of their identity after a while:

"Hi, my name is Bill. I live in New York. I like skiing and pottery."

"Hi, my name is Joan. I have brown hair and I like to travel."

"Hi, my name is Beth. I have fibromyalgia."

The likelihood that this child's parent is over-reacting seems to be in direct proportion to the degree of inconvenience she insists everyone else undergo for the sake of her child.