We interrupt your typical programming to bring you this important announcement. We know that a month hasn't gone by yet, but we recently took Brianne to an allergist and did a blood work up to see what her allergies were. The results, to say the least, are quite interesting.
The week it took to get the results had us reeling our minds around, what else to eggs is she likely allergic to? Peanuts (80% chance), Soy (maybe, she did have a reaction to a soy recipe we made), what else? The blood tests are often considered to provide numerous false positives, so will we need to do a scratch test to be more certain?
With it being Friday, and 8 days after the blood was taken, Kami had to find out. She called the allergist and they had the results! However, they wouldn't give it to her because the Doctor hadn't read them yet. The waiting was excruciating. Finally the Doctor called and gave us the results.
Drum roll please......... and the results are in, Brianne is ONLY allergic to Peanuts. Yes, you read that correctly, the blood test results say she is allergic to Peanuts and nothing else. So the first thing going through our minds was, "That doesn't sound right...", so we did what every good parent would do. We asked questions.
Question #1, why did she break out after having a recipe that contained soy nut butter? It seems, this is actually common. The nut of a soy tree has similar properties of a peanut. The properties are similar enough that someone who is allergic to peanuts, might not be able to eat some soy products (preferably those that use the whole soy nut). Soy milk, extract, and other products that do not use the whole nut may not cause a reaction.
Question #2, why did she break out after eating something containing eggs about 4 months ago? This was really a rhetorical question to ourselves. We needed to think about this, but we also asked the Doctor and he didn't know. His thought was she was likely allergic to something else and not specifically the egg component. After thinking about it, we decided we agreed. Maybe we gave her something that had traces of peanut without knowing it.
We are still not 100% certain that she is not allergic to eggs, but we plan to gradually introduce the eggs back into her diet and will continue to watch for any reaction. I also want to give her eggs just by themselves to completely rule them out at some point.
Those were the two big questions we needed answers to, but thankfully we have a Doctor that cares and he made sure to take care of a very important question we didn't ask. "Do we need an epipen?" The answer is a resounding YES. We are now the owners of 2 epipens (they come in a pack of two), one to keep in the apartment, the other in the diaper bag (or with us at all times).
Funny story (you are sure to get a laugh), so please swallow any drink or food that you may be enjoying right now so you don't choke or spit it out across the room.
My parents were in Fort Wayne for a wedding and afterwards decided to stop by on Sunday morning to see the grandkids (and us kids). We had informed them about the allergy test the day we found out, but we still needed to show them how to use an epipen. So after the initial greetings, I took a pen out of the box on the counter and proceeded to show my mom how to use it. Kami came over and placed her foot on a chair, and I proceeded to pop the top, and then immediately thrust the pen into Kami's thigh. My mom's face was PRICELESS! Her jaw must have hit the ground and skipped a few feet. What my mom didn't know that is with each package of epipens, there is a trainer epipen (has no medication), which is what I was using. Needless to say, I don't think she will ever forget how to use an epipen, so the training was a success.
Thank you for allowing us to interrupt your regular programming, we'll be back on our regular schedule sometime next week with a new release from Keaten, and then two weeks after, an update for Brianne.
Wishing you all the best (as we know you do/or will do the same for
us).
Love,
Matt, Kami, Brianne, and Keaten