I took E to the allergist yesterday. Yesterday morning I had a funny feeling that something was wrong with our appointment and so I called the office to confirm the time. But I was on hold for so long that I gave up and just took E to the office at our scheduled time. Well, my intuiton was right. It turns our that one of the secretaries had cancelled our appointment! I have no idea why and apparently neither did she. But she talked to the doctor and they squeezed us in; we did have to wait for an hour though. It was a good thing I didn’t talk to the office before we got there. If we had they would have made us reschedule for who knows how many months later.
So the allergist confirmed that E is “genetically a very allergic little guy.” The blood test he had done showed high levels of allergies to milk, eggs, peanuts and nuts. (His cashew level was at 100!) The nut-thing came as a little bit of a surprise to me since at his last appointment we only knew that he was allergic to milk. They just wanted me to avoid eggs and nuts with him as a precaution. But now that he has confirmed allergies to eggs AND peanuts AND tree nuts AND milk…well, it’s kind of daunting. I felt like crying when the doctor told me. The doctor said that it would be dangerous for E if someone who had been eating nuts kissed him on the face or changed his diaper without washing their hands (!) Also, he’s almost definitely going to have hay fever and there’s at least a 50% chance that he’ll have asthma. It’s a good thing that N and I are nerds because it doesn’t look like E is going to be the brawny captain of the football team. (Or is it because N and I are nerds that E won the genetic lottery that he did…discuss!)
But the good news is that E isn’t allergic to soy. (Yay!) Now he is free to enjoy the wondrous world of soy-based products. I’m actually quite excited. They now make soy-based cheese and yogurt and things; it will be nice to have some more options to give him. And if you haven’t tasted real cheese, then you wouldn’t know how lame soy cheese is, right? The allergist gave the okay to start him on soy formula which will maybe help him put on some weight and which hopefully he’ll like better than the Nutramigen formula. I’m still breastfeeding him but my supply is dwindling and E isn’t that interested in it any more and so once he’s established on the soy formula I’m going to wean him.
And then I’m going to enjoy me some dairy goodness.
Poor little E! I wonder what causes allergies, like, why do some people have them and others don’t?
Well, I’m glad you saw the silver lining… namely, eating cheese. And what’s better than coming into the Christmas season knowing that you can drink all the eggnog you want?
Poor little E, though. Did the doctor say there was any possibility of him outgrowing any of these allergies? If it’s any consolation, my friend’s baby had very similar allergies but they didn’t find out until he was a little over a year and accidentally ate a cashew crumb while he was at the babysitters. One 911 call and an ambulance later, they figured out he had severe nut, etc allergies. So at least you guys found out with lots of advance warning and can help E. adjust smoothly. I am sure he will love soy cheese.
Good luck with the weaning and enjoy your dairy!
Sorry to hear about the allergies; glad you were able to identify which foods he has to avoid.
If you havent done so already, you might want to research cross contamination, and find out all about how to avoid it, especially for the peanut and nut allergies. But maybe you already know about that, since you’ve been dealing with suspected allergies for a while now.
My son has peanut allergy too. We avoid all “may contain” items, and living overseas complicates things, but fortunately I like baking and I do a lot of home cooking to make up for store-bought foods my son can’t eat. It seems overwhelming at first, especially when children are little and they don’t understand their allergies, but you do get your groove eventually, and build all the precautions into your routine. You’ll be OK, but it’s hard in the beginning; I can really sympathize.