A Peanutty Follow-up

I'm excited to say that the peanut challenge went well! Well, perhaps the actual challenge itself was not good, but I'll explain. Abby started the appointment off with a brave face and slapped some good ol' fashioned peanut-butter on her skin with zero reaction. Then it was off to Alex's skin/contact challenge. As I've said before, you can't teach a kid for almost 6 years to never touch or eat something and then expect him to just slap some on his skin willy-nilly. It didn't go so well for the little guy. He was terrified beyond measure and hid in the back corner of the office with tears free flowing. I couldn't blame him. It broke my heart to see him like that (as always). So we switched gears and gave Abby her oral challenge. Two doses and half an hour later, she didn't have any reactions. So Abby was given the all clear for allergy to peanuts (which I was warned could always change no matter how old you get. Nice, huh?).

Back to Alex. In order to determine his safety at school, we really needed to find out if he has a contact allergy on top of his ingested allergy. With all those peanut-buttery covered hands and faces at lunch, it's possible that one kid might touch him and then BOOM! Allergic reaction follows. I've gone 6 years without using the Epi-pen. I'd like to keep a flawless record. So alas! It came down once again to another round of mama trickery. During an exceptionally hard crying spell, I told him to just give mama a big hug and proceeded to tell him that if he didn't calm down, he was going to give himself an asthma attack. Trust me, it's happened before so it wasn't all just part of the deception. I lifted the back of his shirt up and told him the nurse wanted to watch his breathing for a few minutes and he gratefully put his head on my shoulder and calmed down. The nurse told him that she needed to wipe down his back because it had some 'dirt' on it and then used a wet-wipe with peanut-butter on it to wipe a good-sized area with the potential toxin. Alex is no dummy and instantly went rigid to see what she was 'putting on him'. We told him nothing (mom guilt, mom guilt, mom guilt) and then I got him laughing with lots of mom kisses on the cheek and ear.

Well, I'm blessed to say that nothing happened. No hives. No itching. No swelling. No asthma. Seven minutes with it on his skin and the nurse wiped it off and gave him the all clear for a contact allergy. Turns out that she said food contact allergies are fairly rare and she's only ever heard of two in all her years. So we fessed up. We told Alex the truth about what we did and his eyes were about the size of dessert plates! He smiled and said, "I did it? I'm ok? I'm all done?" I told him that he was safe if someone accidentally touches him and that all he has to do is make sure to get an adult to wash it off for him then go about his day safe and sound. He still has to be extremely careful because if it gets on his hands and he puts his hands on his face or in his mouth, it's very dangerous. But he understands the best a kid his age can and he's doing well.

I am relieved to have some good news for once from one of these blasted life-burdening allergy tests. Usually I walk out of these appointments with a heavy heart and a sad little boy. I still had to deal with the tears and fears, but at least we know a little more about his reactivity to his food allergens. It was a crazy day and I'm glad it's behind us. I'm ever thankful to God these days for Abby's lack of allergies and for the relief from some good news for Alex. We did discover one small thing. Alex was claiming to be 'itchy' before the peanut-butter was even opened from the sheer fear itself. So the doc has said it's about time we did a double-blind milk challenge. There is a chance that Alex is causing a false positive allergic reaction to milk (as his numbers indicate he should be outgrowing it someday). I guess you can give yourself hives and the whole gig with mind-numbing fear. I believe it, but I've seen him start drooling, itching and wheezing after milk. I've also seen the swelling in his throat. So I told the doc we'd deal with that next summer as opposed to dropping more stress on the kiddo's shoulders during school. The doc agrees full-heartedly. What a crazy day! But as always, God is good! Amen!