Last weekend we had an unfortunate (or maybe fortunate??) incident where we discovered Walt is highly allergic to peanuts. Growing up, I was a very severe asthmatic with every allergy under the sun. Since day one, I've been worried about Walt's genetic acquistion of these ailments. Pretty much every time he gets sick, even a cold, we're on breathing treatments. Regarding allergies, while I am allergic to anything with dander (read: all animals), I never had reactions to medicines or food. So, when Dr. G gave us the green light on peanut butter, I all but ran to the store and bought some b/c Walt needs a bit of variety in his diet!
Sunday afternoon after Walt's nap, we were giving him a snack. Chris pulled out some Ritz crackers and thought we should try a bit of peanut butter. I was all for it. Of course, Walt was not (thank goodness!!). He wrinkled his nose and just poked at the cracker. Impatiently, I wiped some peanut butter from the cracker and dabbed it on his lip. More ugly faces. Chris and I laugh....
...then not two minutes later Walt began acting very strange. He kept sticking his tongue out, he began drooling profusely (even more than normal, if that's imaginable), and yawned incessantly. I began to panic. Call it motherly instinct, but I could tell immediately something was wrong. Chris, rightfully, told me to chill out and no sooner did he say that then Walt began puking. Begin Mega Mom Freak Out.
After stripping him of his clothes, pouring Benadryl down his throat, and scrubbing every last ounce of peanut away we looked up and saw Walt's face a splotchy, puffy disaster. Not only was his mouth swollen to no end, but that finger he used to poke the cracker went directly into his eye... so now his eye was swollen half shut.
We were SUPER lucky that was such a controlled experiment. We are now armed with an EpiPen should he be exposed, but his allergy is definitely severe. Hours after this incident, Chris was wrestling and smooching on Walt and Walt's face broke out in hives... b/c Chris had been eating peanut butter. MAN!
On the bright side, I had a great conversation with my long-time allergy/asthma doctor, Dr. Moore, and Walt now gets to meet him too. What a scary thing, but now we know and just need to keep Walt far away from peanuts and anyone else who enjoys them.
I'll leave you with a couple pics of my puffy-faced boy...
