Mom of the Year

First of all, thank you for responding to the previous post. It's nice to know where a few of those hits are coming from. And for those of you who responded, the stalking is mutual. :) The funny thing is that I mentioned having a 6 person audience and wouldn't you know it, I got 6 comments! I'm good.

Now, onto why I'm Mom of the Year.

I was a little distracted at lunchtime today. (Something about the boys pouring baby powder all over Celo's room and in my hallway and having to rush to clean it up while they were eating lunch.) So, in my frazzled state, I gave Diego Celo's plate and gave Celo Diego's plate. Very very bad. Diego took one tiny bite of his sandwich, swallowed a piece, spit the rest out, and started crying. He was like, "Mommy! This has cheese in it!" He then vomited all over the place. And THEN, this happened:

When he was done throwing up, he started complaining that his lip hurt. He said it was itchy. I looked at it and noticed it was swollen. It's hard to see in a picture, but the middle of his top lip started to swell and get little spots on it. Here's Diego pointing to it.

He's semi-smiling in the picture which means that by this time he had forgiven me for my awful mistake and all was well again.

Anyway, THAT'S why Celo hardly ever gets to eat cheese. So I can avoid accidentally giving his food to his very allergic brother.

Mom. Of. The. Year.

Life With An Allergic Child

Sometimes, Diego's allergies really get me down. Usually, I make myself focus on the fact that there are far worse things, and that in the big picture, it's really not that terrible. I know Marcelo and I are really blessed that Diego and little Marcelo are relatively healthy kids. But every once in awhile, I allow myself to get a little sad about the fact that there are a lot of foods that could make Diego really, really sick.

When you have a child with severe allergies, you have to be a hawk. At 28 months, Diego doesn't understand that the foods that his little cousins or friends are eating could make him have a bad reaction. So whenever we go somewhere where there's going to be food, I have to watch him like a hawk to make sure he doesn't steal something off of someone's plate. I think this age is especially hard because 1) he doesn't really understand his allergies yet, and 2) most toddler foods are not Diego-friendly. Goldfish crackers, mac & cheese, cookies, ice cream, pizza, hamburgers, even certain chicken nuggets are not okay because of the breading.

Honestly, I haven't really figured out the best way to handle it yet. When I go to a playgroup, I can never relax and enjoy some adult conversation because I'm worried that Diego is off in someone's room, trying to grab a forbidden food out of their hands. But I'm starting to realize that I need to step up and get control of the situation. Probably the best thing to do would be to ask all the moms if it's okay for me to bring the snacks for everyone, so that everyone is eating Diego-friendly foods. But then the stupid, shy part of me is like, "But maybe that'll just be a big inconvenience for everyone and maybe they'll think I'm super complicated and annoying." Well, that part of me needs to shut it because this is my baby's health! I think most of the moms I'm around on a regular basis just don't know the extent of his allergy. And how could they if I don't tell them?

Marcelo and I have decided to start taking pictures each time Diego has a bad reaction. There have been many many reactions, most including a lot of vomiting, but these are the only ones I've captured on camera.

This is from December. He tipped over a cup that had seriously a drop of chocolate milk in it. After touching the milk with his hand, he touched his eye. Just that skin contact caused his eye to get red and swollen.

This one is from April. It's from sunscreen. He breaks out in a rash with every sunscreen I've tried. This picture was actually taken before it got even more red and puffy.

And this was two days ago and it was all my fault. Again, it was just skin contact. I handed him a wagon wheel cookie that I was going to give Marcelito. I assumed they were made out of the same thing as the rice puffs I always give them, so I didn't bother to read the label. Diego held the cookie for a minute and then said he didn't want it. Then he started rubbing his face like crazy. He turned all red, broke out in little bumps, his eyelids got swollen, and his nose started running like crazy. I could tell his nose was itching him really badly because he couldn't stop rubbing it. He rubbed so much he made it bleed.

The rest of the stuff on his face is remnants from his lunch. He made quite the mess that day. Anyway, as soon as I saw the reaction, I checked the label and sure enough: non-fat dry milk. So I gave him benadryl, put him in the bathtub with very warm water, and prayed that he would keep breathing. His nose got so stuffy and he seemed to have a hard time breathing for a little while, but the benadryl finally kicked in and he started to clear up. I just sat next to the tub and cried. I just had a moment of self-pity that we have to deal with this and that poor Diego has to live with such boundaries.

The thing with food allergies is, you never know if the next reaction is going to be severe. That's why we have to carry the Epi pen. That's why I'm such a freak about people giving my son food.

I don't know why I'm writing this publicly. I guess I just want everyone around us to know how serious it is. I've spent too much time not opening up about it and just expecting people to know. But I'm done being shy and I'm ready to "inconvenience" others, if it means I'll keep my son safe.

Allergy Boy

It was bound to happen. Diego got ahold of Celo's milk today. It was my fault. I had put it in one of Diego's sippy cups because Celo is constantly trying to drink out of Diego's cups. I didn't put it high enough out of Diego's reach, so he grabbed it and drank some. Guess what happened after that.

Puking.

Puking.

And more puking.

Poor kid. He must have thrown up about 7 times. And then he broke out in a rash. It makes us so sad to see how incredibly allergic he is to milk. Just yesterday, some of Marcelito's milk spilled on the floor, and Diego touched it (even though I frantically told him not to, while I tried to wipe it up), and broke out in a rash. Just from touching it. And a couple of weeks ago, at playgroup, his cousin was eating Goldfish, and he took one. And just from that, he got a rash around his mouth. I wish I could ask everyone to not let their kids have those kinds of snacks around Diego. At least while he's too young to understand why he can't eat that stuff. But I feel like I can't ask that of them because it's MY problem to deal with, not theirs. Sometimes it makes me just not want to take him to playgroup until he's old enough to understand. But I can't shelter him and he has to learn.

Anyway, we dealt with today's reaction with good old Benadryl. It took away the rash within about an hour. Episodes like this make it very hard to hold on to the hope that he'll one day grow out of these allergies.

So the next step here is to buy Celo a completely different style of sippy cups. Well, as different as we can find. Our plan was going to be to just color code, for example, Diego was going to get all the orange cups (because it's his very favorite color), and Celo was going to get the blue ones. But that's not going to work. We'll have to find a different kind and let Diego know from the start that he can't drink out of them.

It's hard to think about what the future is going to be like. If he has these accidents while I'm able to be in control of his surroundings, what's going to happen when he goes off to school and I'm no longer in control? I'll tell you what's going to happen. He'll be wearing a big giant sign that says, "I'm HIGHLY allergic to..." (the long list of foods).

Oh, and it does not need to be pointed out that Diego should probably not be using sippy cups anymore. I know. But what can I do if he thinks it's fun to turn normal cups upside down and let all the liquid spill out?

Allergies, Allergies, and More Allergies

Well, Diego is now 18 months old, so we got him tested for allergies. And surprise, surprise, he's allergic to everything.

Here's the official list:
Milk
Eggs
All nuts, including coconut
Cats
Dogs

Yup. He's a little nerd boy. It's so frustrating. I never thought I'd have to deal with this since I didn't think it ran in the family. But apparently it does, somewhere. So I will spend my life reading labels and make him separate meals. I've pretty much given up on him out growing this because when they tested him, the milk allergy was the highest it could be. I don't see that going away any time soon.

Ugh, the way they tested him was awful. They had to fill like 27 vials of blood, while we held him down. Okay, it was really 6 or 7, but it felt like a lot more. It took forever, and he just laid there crying and screaming. It was horrible.

Allergies

So, we've discovered that Diego is allergic to milk. I am soooo sad about this. It sucks. He can't drink milk, eat cheese, sour cream, cream cheese, nothing. He's also allergic to eggs. I don't know if it's egg whites, or egg yolks, or both. We found out when we gave him some milk and he threw up several times immediately after drinking it. He throws up cheese, too. And with eggs he breaks out all over his face. It's so sad! I hope he grows out of it. It's possible! When I was little, I was allergic to canned fish like tuna and sardines. And I grew out of it.

I'll keep my fingers crossed. What kid can't eat macaroni and cheese???