No Peanuts For Parker:(

This is our new Motto!

Yesterday Parker and I ventured to his first allergist appointment. He has always had a reaction to peanuts. Usually throwing up or just getting itchy. However it's gotten worse and the last time we went to Logan's for dinner he had to leave the restaurant because just being in there without even eating a peanut gave him a reaction.

I wasn't really sure what to expect at this appointment. They told me it was going to be 3 hours. My first thought was "ARE YOU KIDDING ME?" 3 hours in a doctors office. My second thought was.....Thank god its not Sam going through this. Parker is sooooo much braver when it comes to the doctor. I know that is horrible BUT I'm just being honest:)

We were greeted by Maria, a FABULOUS nurse. She was so good with Parks. She brought us to our room where we would be spending the next 3 hours. She talked us through how the appointment would go. She talked directly to Parker and didn't treat him like an insignificant person in the room so I knew she and I would get along. He is very sharp, he wants to be acknowledged and talked to directly. For some reason there are quite a few adults that don't seem to understand that?!?!?

Then the doctor came in and checked him over. We made the appointment because of his peanut allergy HOWEVER we have noticed that for the past 6 months to a year he sneezes like crazy every morning and then by mid-morning he is fine. She took one look at him and said she could tell he was a kid that suffered from allergies. She looked inside his nose and said it was very raw, inflamed and swollen (my poor baby) I felt horrible. How did I not realize he had been suffering so bad. She said they would do a full allergy testing on him. Checking for not only peanut allergies but for The usual....Mold, dust, trees, pollen all that.

The first test was pretty easy. He had to lay on his tummy for like 15 minutes straight. She pricked him with about 50 little toothpick looking things. The hard part was he had to lay there for 10 minutes while it was itching and not move. The Peanut scratch was CRAZY. It swelled up bigger than the size of a quarter. She was pretty shocked that he is THAT allergic and has never had to be hospitalized for his allergy.

The next step is they give him shots right under the skin on his one arm to see if the higher dosage would cause a reaction. I wasn't sure how this was going to go. They gave him two shots and he kind of panicked. He was like Nope, I don't want you to do that anymore. The nurse had a panicked look also and I found out later its because she hates having to hold kids down. I told them to give me a minute so I could talk to him. I knew she was probably rolling her eyes at me but I knew I could talk him into it. She brought in another nurse Miss Leslie who was a little older and grandmotherly. Parks really took to her and let her hold his hand. He sucked it up and let her do the other FIFTEEN shots. I have NEVER been more proud of my little boy. He was such a trooper.

After that she had to do 5 more shots on the other arm. I asked Parker if it was ok, he said "Fine, I'll do 5 more but then thats it......and I want a new toy" I said, you got it buddy. Again he did great.

This a picture of the 17 shots she did on his right arm. This is 1 day after. Still welts and still itchy. She wrote numbers and then did the shots right next to the number so she could keep track.

This is his left arm after the 5 shots. Again this is almost 24 hours later and he still has welts.

After all that she came back and said that obviously he is allergic to peanuts. Life-threatening allergic....Yikes! So we went through all the things we need to do, how to talk to his pre-school, how to get a medic-alert bracelet (I'm suuuure he is going to wear that! Ha!) then we got to the other allergies.

He is allergic to Dust Mites, Mold, Grass, Trees, Cockroaches, Cats and DOGS! I was shocked. She said they are all significant allergies. He is REALLY allergic to dogs:( I hope he grows out of that one though because he LOVES animals and we always talked about getting him a dog when he gets older. He is very reactive to Dust-mites. Which live in Stuffed animals, carpets, blankets, pillows. Ya know everything Parker has been sleeping with. So last night Nate DEEP cleaned his bedroom. We are going to get dust covers for his pillows and hopefully help with the problem. He said he is fine with no stuffies in his bed. She gave us some Zyrtec to give him at night and in the morning. I gave it to him last night and this morning and he has only sneezed once so far. She also gave us a nasal "Wash" we tried to do it last night. I showed him how to do it by doing it on myself first and WOW that is a weird sensation. It goes up one nostril and out the other. I tried to do it on him and he did NOT enjoy it. I said we would try again later. We are going back to the allergist in 6 months to see how he is doing. If nothing has improved we will start allergy shots which help build up his immunities so that he won't actually have allergies. They are expensive and very time consuming, they said it takes almost 3-5 years to be through the shots. So if he gets better without having to put him through all that great, if not, we will become very close with the allergist:)

Hopefully we Will see less of this soon!