What can I eat with alpha-gal syndrome? It's complicated

Jessica Overcast lives with her family in the small Douglas County town of Ava in rural southern Missouri.

She vividly remembers her first trip to the grocery store after learning that her daughter, Lyla, has alpha-gal syndrome — a tickborne condition that can cause allergic reactions to alpha-galactose, a sugar molecule most commonly found in red meats and other products derived from mammals.

“I just, I sat there with this app that they said to use to figure out what she could eat, and I cried in the aisleway,” Overcast said. “I don't know what to feed my kid anymore.”

And she said it wasn’t even just about figuring out what foods to avoid.

Provided by dietician Maddy Clemons / Springfield Hy-Vee Stores

“It was medication, it was lotions, it was soaps,” Overcast recalled. “Becaus