Curse of the Januaries

I don't know what it is, but every January since my son has been born, he has had some sort of weird funky medical condition.  The first time it happens, it just happens, the second time it happens its a coincidence, the third time it happens it becomes a pattern.....or a curse!

January 2010 is when Carter got super sick and had to be hospitalized and then on oxygen for a week.

January 2011 similar situation where Carter got sick, but didn't need the oxygen - April 2011 however is when he got double pneumonia and was super sick.

January 2012 Carter has a sever allergic reaction to a cashew.  No joke this experience freaked me out more than any other illness either child has ever had.  Haylee's fever of 107 is right up there with this experience, but seriously, this freaked me out.

Let me explain our recent curse.

We were at my parents hanging out and my mom had put out some mixed nuts, cheese and crackers.  We have given Carter peanuts and peanut butter before this, so it wasn't as if he had never had peanuts or cashews before.  Carter asked his Daddy if he could have a peanut and Byron of course gave him one.  Byron said the second he ate it, he knew something wasn't right.  Carter immediately began rubbing at his ears and his eyes, rubbing his face, etc.  Then his face began to swell.  He walked around whining a little, so I picked him up and tried to snuggle with him. He didn't want it and kept rubbing at his face.  Byron left to go get some benadryl from our house, and in the short time that he was gone, Carter's face swelled even more.  I called the on-call Dr. who told us to give him the benadryl and then get to the nearest emergency room.  Hearing that I needed to get to the nearest emergency room sent me in to overdrive.  Byron and I got the benadryl down Carter then we booked it up to Children's Hospital - North Campus.  They don't mess around with peanut allergies.  No joke, the second we got our half sheet of  paper with his name and phone number on it, the nurse was out there asking if we were the "peanut" patient.  They whisked us back into triage, took a look at him, took his oxygen levels and then got us back into our room.

The doctor walked in and had us give the run down of what happened.  As she was explaining the peanut allergy to us, Carter began shaking and then threw up everywhere.  All over himself, all over the floor and all over his daddy.  This of course freaked him out and he cried.  We got him changed into a cute gown and daddy changed into scrubs of his own then settled into the bed to watch Lightning McQueen.  They gave Carter some steroids to help calm his system down as well as an anti-nausea pill to help his poor tummy.

A look at his hives - this wasn't even the worst they looked!

After a few hours the nurse came in and trained Byron and I on how to use an Epi-pen.  That added to my level of freaking out.  This is serious.  I know that allergies and Epi-pens are common, but when you have to consider jabbing a large needle into your two year old's thigh if he comes into contact with peanuts, you realize that this is a severe allergy, and if you don't have that pen on you, bad things could happen.  For the doctor to sit there and tell us that in this exact situation if it were to happen again; everything we saw change on Carter, it is absolutely a situation where you would need to use the Epi-pen, scared me.  He was still playing with his legos, he wasn't crying, he wasn't turning blue like you would think when you hear administer the Epi-pen, his face was swollen and he was making noises like he was clearing his throat; I had no idea that his reaction was so severe.

Our plan as of now (less than 24 hours after him eating the cashew) is to train everyone on how to use the Epi-pen, and to get him into an allergist ASAP.   We shall see how it goes.  I have never experienced a real full on allergic reaction from anyone.  To see my little boy swell up, get hives an hour and a half after we had given him the benadryl and be told that this is all apart of what the allergy will do to his little body, it wore me down.

On a positive note, we were close to the hospital, Byron and I were there to see what happened, and now we have the meds we need in case this happens again....

2012 sure has started out jam packed for the Pletcher family!  Here's to hoping things calm down!