Counting My Blessings

Yesterday was a rough one for me. Let me backtrack a bit to give you some background information...

In March of this year, when my daughter was 8 1/2 months old, she got the 6 month vaccination. A few hours later I gave her a few small bites of my scrambled eggs that I was eating. She had a really hard time falling asleep and later in the night she woke up screaming and we found her body covered in hives (or something like that. Bumpy all over, red and splotchy in some areas). We figured she was having an allergic reaction to something so we booked it over to the ER. Her poor face was all swollen too, but luckily she seemed to be breathing just fine. It was an allergic reaction and they gave her some Benadryl and sent us on our way.

Since then she has not had any eggs. We went to my family doctor shortly after to get a referral for an allergist but the wait was at least a year long. Not too long after we had to go to the clinic for something and I mentioned it to the doctor there and he referred us to a local paediatrician who specializes in allergies. We were able to get an appointment there in just a few months. Which brings us to yesterday.

My mom was over for the day so I brought her along with me to our appointment. I really didn't know what to expect but was just hoping that the outbreak in March would have been a coincidence or something. At the most I figured we'd leave the appointment with a confirmed egg allergy and resume living life as we were.

The doctor brought Cheyenne and I into the room and we talked about what happened in March and about her eczema and about my random fruit allergy, etc. He then made about 12 marks on Cheyenne's arm and placed a small drop beside each mark. He was testing for a bunch of common allergies like mold, dust mites, sesame, cats, dogs, tree nuts, feathers, eggs, peanuts, etc. I can't remember them all. After the drops were on he took a little scraper thing and scratched the liquid into the top layer of her skin. Then we had to wait about 15 minutes, and not even a minute later Cheyenne was already scratching her arm. I pulled down her sleeve so she wouldn't disturb it.

We went back in to see the doctor and when we pulled up her sleeve there were 4 obvious bumps/reactions. He measures them in millimeters based on the diameter (or maybe circumference?) of the reaction. The smallest reaction was for cats, about 2mm. So nothing serious but still enough to cause a reaction (could this be part of what is causing her skin flare ups and itchiness? That's what we're wondering now.) The next one was eggs at about 5mm. Pretty serious. Then was peanuts at around 6mm and the biggest reaction was to tree nuts, 7mm. (Tree nuts include, but are not limited to, cashews, walnuts, pistachios, pecans, etc.)

He told me Cheyenne has a life-threatening allergy toward tree nuts. Excuse me? You can't say my daughter's name and "life-threatening" in the same sentence. Cue the tears. I couldn't grasp what was happening. I came here to confirm an egg allergy and left with a life-threatening nut allergy along with peanuts, eggs and cats! The egg allergy she can possibly outgrow, but the nut allergy not so much. There's a 25% chance that she could grow out of the nut allergy.

This is how he explained the situation: Cheyenne's airway is about the width of her pinky finger right now. If you look at the size of the reaction from the nuts it's bigger than her pinky finger, meaning it could close up her airway completely.

If the drop that they put on her contains the smallest trace of the nut allergen and it caused that severe of a reaction just on her arm you can imagine what would happen if she ate an entire walnut, or other nut. Nothing good, that's for sure.

So I was taught how to use an epipen. I'm picking it up today from the pharmacist. I hoping we never need to use it.

All that being said, it was an emotional day for me yesterday. Lots of "what-if's" going through my mind. Lots of worst case scenarios that I hate to even think about. Thinking about what foods we need to get rid of in our house and what foods to buy in the future that don't contain eggs or any trace of nuts. How to train Cheyenne to always ask if there are nuts or eggs in any food that someone might offer her. The list goes on.

But among all my fears I have so much to be grateful for. Remember that dermatologist that I've mentioned who did nothing to help Cheyenne's skin? Well, he mentioned that kids with eczema tend to have a higher chance of being allergic to nuts. So I never gave her nuts to fear of her having an allergy. Thank you God for this dermatologist and that he mentioned this fact, even if he didn't help Cheyenne's skin he might have saved her life. We thank God that she hasn't found picked a nut off the floor and eaten it. Thankful that we never accidentally gave her something containing nuts. Thankful that our Girlie is still alive and that we never had to have an emergency situation where she couldn't breath. Thankful that the reaction she had to the eggs in March was minor in comparison to what it could've been and that we were able to keep eggs out of her life from there on out with the cooperation of our family and friends as well.

Counting my blessings. One beautiful baby girl that has made our lives to so full of joy and so rewarding. Two parents that couldn't imagine life without her. And one huge family (including friends!) who have loved and supported us and Cheyenne since before she was born! We can cope with this allergy. It just means a few adjustments in our life but so worth it. Our "norm" will just be a little different from yours, and even from what we've been used to, but it will be OUR norm and we will love it and adapt to it!

Thanks for reading! Thanks for encouraging and supporting!

Here's my Girlie:

Enjoy the rest of your week!