Allergies ~ Schmallergies the life we have to live by

It all started when Mattias was about one. When we would give him a bottle at night he would usually projectile vomit it back up about 15 minutes later. Finally when we at the doctor's I asked her about it and she thought we should get his blood drawn to check it out. So we did, my poor little baby it took three of us to hold him down to get his blood drawn. Once we were done we went home and waited. It didn't take that long maybe a day for the nurse to call me and tell me that my son was basically allergic to the world. He was allergic to Cats, Dogs, Peanuts, Eggs, Wheat, Dairy, I am sure the list was even longer, but that is all I can remember 6 years later.

This was a huge hit, I was expecting one little thing like a dairy allergy, but it was a ton of things. Completely overwhelmed on how I was going to feed my child, what could he actually eat. Well let me tell you, as overwhelmed as I was, and I did shed a few tears over this, I learned that I had to read food labels. Reading food labels in a busy grocery store when all you want to do is get your items and get out was not fun. The other not so fun thing was me having to change my diet too, how else are you going to get a toddler to eat food that you won't eat? I did and made a few errors on the way, like vegan cheese, not so great back then. You know when you you’re starting to feed your baby baby food and try some to get them to try it and even though it is completely awful you do your best to make the best this is the best food ever face? Well I couldn't do that for him with the vegan cheese.

The doctor also wanted to go see an Allergist Specialist, so we went and met a specialist. She wanted us to continue staying away from all of the foods for now and even wanted us to consider getting rid of our cats. Mattias had a lot of respiratory issues. A year later we tested him again, and there were only three allergies that remained. Cats, Eggs and Peanuts. This was a lot easier to cope with and we slowly added dairy and wheat back into our diet. He has done well with that.

Then we had Kristin, we started her off with all the normal baby foods, and about one year old, I took her to get checked at the allergist too. Surprise Surprise she tested positive for Cat, Eggs and Peanuts too. At least we were already avoiding these items because of Mattias, so we painfully gave up our cats and continued to feed our kids everything, but Eggs & Peanuts.

Then they gave us Epi Pens to carry with us at all time.  We were really good at first taking the Epi Pens everywhere with us.

Last year 2011

 I went to see a natural path because I was so done with my allergies.  Basically what I found out that I was severely intolerant to Gluten.  I was actually 30 points higher than high.  Basically my body was creating mucous and making my nose stuffy all the time, because it was ruining my stomach lining.  She said that I might have to give up dairy eventually, because the gluten & dairy protein are very similar.  I gave up Gluten for 6 months, but I practically lived on Dairy because I could have breads and other quick snacks that I liked.  Eventually I gave up dairy too and I am even better.

Fast forward to the present year

The kids have really had no problems with their allergies, we don’t expose them to any of the foods they are allergic too.   I have even been way more relaxed on carrying their Epi Pens most of the summer; I didn’t even have them on me.

Late August, we went in for our annual check up, so see how they are doing.  Mattias choose not to get testing to see if he is still allergic, so he is still allergic until we have the test done again and the doctor is not pushing him to get tested.  We got a new Epi-Pen for him.  Kristin this past winter, Spring & Summer (well pretty much year round) has Psoriasis.   She gets scaly, red & dry skin patches all over her body.  We saw a dermatologist and we are now doing Phototherapy every week and she is getting better.  So I wanted to get her checked out for a Dairy allergy too.  She doesn’t east cheese very often and she loves milk, but complains of a stomachache afterwards.  They did the test and it came back negative, which was very exciting to me.  They wrote her a prescription for an Epi- Pen too.

 

Tuesday October 9^th, 2012

I was at work today and received a phone call from Jean, the secretary, at Llewellyn.  She asked for me and then told me there is nothing to worries about, but Kristin’s eyes are swelling and that I should bring her some Benadryl and come pick her up from school.  I quickly left work, went to target to get some Benadryl and headed to school.  It is amazing how slow people go when you’re in a hurry, it felt like an eternity before I got there.  This is what I arrived too:

 

Kristin as soon as I arrived to school

I took one look at her and said oh sweetie, poured her some Benadryl, and took her picture. 

 

You might think I am crazy for taking her picture, but I learned long ago when Mattias was broken out into Hives, gave him some Benadryl and by time we got to the doctor they were all gone and it was pretty much a wasted trip with a sit and wait game.  Later that evening they came back.

I questioned Kristin repeatedly if she shared food this day, or eat candy or play with a flower “that had honey” this is a story for another day.

I called the doctor on the way out of the school.  We had to see a different doctor, and she said just continue with the Benadryl.  The next day, her eyes were still puffy, but not nearly what they were the day before, but being a mom, I called the doctor again.  They said they could see me tomorrow.  We went and saw Doctor Shah Thursday, and showed her the pictures, she examines her and even tested her for strep throat, because it was red, her test came back negative, and she prescribe her Prednisone to help with her inflammation.  She also suggested we follow up with the Allergist. 

This was later in the afternoon after visting the doctor

This was at bed time the first night

This was the next day

Today we went and saw the Allergist.  We talked and talked and they decided to rest her egg and dairy skin test.  Well this time her egg is still positive and now dairy is positive.  So now we are Dairy Free for Kristin, for at least a week. 

Here is her skin test today. The H is a Histamine, the S is saline (Neutralizer) 1 & 2 are Egg (white & Yolk) and 4 &5 is dairy (casein and milk). As you can see they are all pretty equal minus the "S"

We are going to go in next week and do a two hour test with dairy foods that we feed her on a day to day basis.  So until next week Kristin is Dairy Free too.  It shouldn’t be that hard because so am I.

 To be Continued…