Battle of the Allergies

Get ready folks, this is a long one!

We have suspected for about six months that Alexis has a nut allergy...not peanuts, just other nuts. She happily snacks on peanut butter and various other peanut products! But one day about six months ago at a friend's house, Alexis ate her first nut, a pistachio, in fact. At the first crunch, she started screaming that her mouth hurt and her stomach hurt. Thinking that she just didn't know how to express that she didn't like it, I down played the whole thing (also sort of embarrassed that she might puke at someone else's house!). Luckily, she did not puke and after drinking 85 loads of water and eating something else, she finally calmed down. This, however, was not enough to convince me. About 2 months after that, she ate another nut....same thing happened. You would think that my brain might get clued in, but, oh no, not yet. Fast forward to July 4th. After the Peachtree Road Race, they were handing out Lara Bars. We took a couple and Alexis ate one when we got home. Since this time she liked the taste, she ate the whole thing. You can use your imagination here folks, but what happened was not pretty. Just close your eyes and imagine ALOT of puke, ALOT of screaming, and ALOT of mouth hurting. Fun! You may even think fun enough to GET A FREAKIN' CLUE that she might not be able to eat nuts. But, no, not yet. Fast forward to sometime in August when we have run out of milk (oh the insanity). I decide to give Alexis a glass of Almond Milk instead. I'll let you use your imagination again. FINALLY, I GOT A CLUE. Hmmmm.....there seems to be a pattern here. Fast forward again to the end of August and we are at the pediatrician. I happen to mention these incidents and the doctor says immediately she must go to the allergist. She refers us to someone and we make the appointment for yesterday.

So up until the appointment, we hear from everyone we know who has had allergy testing how HORRIFIC it is. Great, thanks for the undue stress and imagining of possible scenarios occuring in my head. I decide to opt out of bringing Max especially since they said the appointment could be 2-3 hours. So Alexis and I arrive promptly at 9:10 and we talk to the dr. about what has been going on. He says he is going to do skin testing with 16 pokes. She must lie stomach to stomach with me with her shirt off. They tell her it's going to feel like a pine cone poking her back. Like she knows what that feels like. Who has ever poked a pine cone on their back??? Anyway, she doesn't even cry as they push the plastic little boxes on her back. She has to sit for 3 minutes with the liquid on. Everything going smoothly until it starts itching and she can't scratch it. After 3 minutes, the nurse wipes off the liquids. Still must sit for 15 minutes and NO SCRATCHING. Insert MUCH screaming here. The nurse comes in and says a good remedy is to blow on it or fan it. So I start fanning Alexis's back (which by the way, she calls "winding" her). Ahhh, screaming stops. 15 minutes later, hydrocortisone applied, we are back to being happy. The doctor comes back and says that she is highly allergic to cashews. Also, pistachios and almonds (duh, could have called those). He says the cashew allergy is enough to warrant carrying around an Epipen in case of accidental ingestion. No more eating anything with nuts, anything that has touched nuts, NO MORE NUTS. Oh, and they were also testing for egg since when Alexis eats whole eggs, she gets sick (not anything with eggs in it, just whole eggs like scrambled eggs or egg salad). The egg mark only came up slightly so he wanted to do some bloodwork for any sort of confirmation on it or if it's just an egg sensitivity. Oh goody.....bloodwork. He wants to see us back in two weeks so we better get that bloodwork done ASAP which of course you can't do there and you have to go to some lab somewhere else entirely. After we are done, Alexis wants to know if she can go to school. Sure, girlfriend, whatever works. Dropped her off at school!

Fast forward to today. Pick her up from school and head to the lab. Get lost, call lab, finally find lab. Oy, not a good start. When we get there, Alexis reluctantly sits in the big gray lab chair. Gets all settled in and then, "mommy, I have to go to the potty". Ok, great. Let's go. Get to the potty and NOTHING. Head back to the big gray chair and the screaming begins. Did I mention that I am also holding Max during all of this. She is screaming and running away from the chair (not that I can blame her). I put Max down and give him some food (food makes him happy). Get in the big gray chair myself and hold Alexis in my lap. I am holding her other arm with all my might as the nurse is pulling her blood-giving arm straight to wrap with a rubber band and begin drawing blood. Alexis was already screaming so much that she didn't even notice when the needle went in. As the vials are being filled, Max decides to stand up. He trips and falls and hits his head on the chair. Awesome. He starts his pass-out cry. Awesome. He passes out underneath the chair while I cannot move to help him nor can the nurse who has a needle in Alexis's arm. Awesome. The nurse looks at me with this very questioning glance. I tell the nurse that he does this pass-out thing when he is mad or hurt. The nurse asks if he is okay. I say, "He will be, I hope". Many times after he passes out he falls asleep. So there is Max passed out on the stone cold tile floor at a blood drawing lab and is now asleep on same stone cold tile floor. Awesome. Does somewhere have a candid camera somewhere? I mean, really. Finally, she gets done and reaches down for Max while I am calming Alexis. She picks him up and of course he wakes up and starts crying. She immediately hands him to me. Two crying kids, one in each arm. We start to walk out the door. The once empty waiting room now has about 8 people in it staring at me. Awesome. As I'm walking out carrying both kids, I hear a woman say, "I wonder which one it was?". My question is "I wonder what kind of drink I will have when I get home".