Yesterday, you started the day at one year old. You finished it as a two year old. It doesn't feel like it's been two full years since you came to our arms.
You are a wonder. You are a joy. You are a sweetheart, a charmer, and one of the most laid back children I've ever had the privilege to know. You are perpetually happy, you blow kisses, and have a smile for everyone you meet.
In the last year we've watched you change so much. You still love to cuddle, and to nurse, but you also love to run, jump and play pretend. You make the tastiest soup I've ever had - even if it is served in a colander. You've started talking to us. You learned to sign, we learned to help you by taking dairy out of your diet. You gained an attention span, and you drink more water than anyone I've ever known. EVER. Today alone you went through at least five eight-ounce sippy cups of water. You make faces, smile and wave, you eat like you have a hollow leg, and you're learning how to treat other people. You have a love of all things that move, including buses, cars and now trains. You know your letters, and the sounds that many of them make. You picked up a good dozen more words in the last three days.
Your speech is garbled, and a lot of times it's unclear. But it doesn't matter. You're genuine, you're helpful, and you try so very hard.
I look at you now, and can only just barely see the teeny baby I held in my arms, and smuggled into my hospital bed two years ago tonight. You are my joy, and my treasure, and everything I could ever hope to have in a son. Two years ago tonight, you were exactly the same to me, but now... there is so much more to you. We still sleep together, side by side, but tonight Daddy will join us, and we will read The Adventures of Winnie the Pooh before we sleep. We all sleep a little better knowing that we are all safe and together, all within arm's reach, and all full of love for each other.
This has been a hard year for me. You've changed so very much, and I needed to change to keep up with you. I've had more time to think about how you came into the world, and I've been able to forgive myself for how poorly it went. I forever hope you will forgive me as well. I am still not all better, but every day, and every genuine, spontaneous kiss from a small boy helps heal the craziness inside my heart and head. You are the best thing that could have ever happened to me, and I love you more than life. You are a blessing. You always have been, and you always will be. I'm so excited to see what this next year brings to us, and so grateful to be on the journey with you.
All my love,
Mommy.
Monday, August 9, 2010
Thursday, August 5, 2010
Interesting. Very interesting.
So, I was clicking through links on a Food Allergy Carnival today (hosted by Rational Jenn), and happened to click through a link from Katie at A New Fit (entitled "Allergy Testing," you see where my interest came into play). In it, she summarizes her experience with Skin Prick Testing (SPT), I read it over, and my jaw hit the floor. It occurred to me how my child could have so many and varied reactions to dairy and yet test negatively. Here is Katie's synopsis:
When LP had his SPT done, the doctor distractedly listened to my synopsis of LP's reactions. He glanced at the records I had meticulously kept for months for all of about ten seconds, then asked me a few questions - all of which were covered in the records - and then nodded. He focused almost exclusively on LP's poor tolerance of soy formula, and paid no attention to my accounts of his spitting up in volumes over an ounce at an episode, multiple times daily, and to the fact that it continued across his liquid-diet-only days into his solid-food-days as well. He wrote off all behavioral changes (including things like the head-banging and biting), and generally made a show of not paying attention to anything I had to say beyond the sentence the words were in.
Next up, the nurse / doctor did not mark him up at all. As in, not a single pen mark showing where anything was.
There were pinpricks. This is true. The pinpricks were preceded by swabs of individual allergens.
Twenty minutes?!? WOW. No. When we went in, LP was poked, the allergist wiped the swab liquids away (all at once, which STILL strikes me as a massive cross-contamination issue), then came in after ten minutes (tops), told me that the only positive indicator was the one designed to be positive, had me put LP's shirt back on, and within ten minutes had us on our way. So, when they should have been reading the test, LP and I were on our way out to the car. By the time we made the 1.5+ hour trek back home, his back was clear (including the histimine area), but he was showing all the hallmarks of a dairy reaction.
Isn't it interesting how something like this happened? How without even doing the test properly, the doctor not only felt it appropriate to re-introduce dairy as a major component of LP's diet, but also to insist that I am a poor parent for not allowing him to have eaten it all along?
Amazing. Just amazing. Eventually, we will have additional testing done. It will have to wait for now, and in the meantime, we are functioning as though we have a positive confirmation diagnosis as allergic, but I suddenly understand, in some measure, how it is that my child, with his myriad and multi-systemic reactions came up as "not allergic."
After meeting with the doctor and going over my allergy history he decided it would be best to have a full allergy panel skin test done. I hadn't been tested for environmental allergies (pollen, trees, grasses, weeds, etc.) since high school so it seemed like a good idea. For those of you who have had the prick test done before, you know what this entails. But for everyone else, the process is as follows:
- the nurse marks up your back with a pen
- the nurse then pricks you with small needles (today I was lucky enough to have about 60 of those pricks)
- You lay on your stomach for 20 minutes while everything "settles in"
- The doctor then comes in to read your test
When LP had his SPT done, the doctor distractedly listened to my synopsis of LP's reactions. He glanced at the records I had meticulously kept for months for all of about ten seconds, then asked me a few questions - all of which were covered in the records - and then nodded. He focused almost exclusively on LP's poor tolerance of soy formula, and paid no attention to my accounts of his spitting up in volumes over an ounce at an episode, multiple times daily, and to the fact that it continued across his liquid-diet-only days into his solid-food-days as well. He wrote off all behavioral changes (including things like the head-banging and biting), and generally made a show of not paying attention to anything I had to say beyond the sentence the words were in.
Next up, the nurse / doctor did not mark him up at all. As in, not a single pen mark showing where anything was.
There were pinpricks. This is true. The pinpricks were preceded by swabs of individual allergens.
Twenty minutes?!? WOW. No. When we went in, LP was poked, the allergist wiped the swab liquids away (all at once, which STILL strikes me as a massive cross-contamination issue), then came in after ten minutes (tops), told me that the only positive indicator was the one designed to be positive, had me put LP's shirt back on, and within ten minutes had us on our way. So, when they should have been reading the test, LP and I were on our way out to the car. By the time we made the 1.5+ hour trek back home, his back was clear (including the histimine area), but he was showing all the hallmarks of a dairy reaction.
Isn't it interesting how something like this happened? How without even doing the test properly, the doctor not only felt it appropriate to re-introduce dairy as a major component of LP's diet, but also to insist that I am a poor parent for not allowing him to have eaten it all along?
Amazing. Just amazing. Eventually, we will have additional testing done. It will have to wait for now, and in the meantime, we are functioning as though we have a positive confirmation diagnosis as allergic, but I suddenly understand, in some measure, how it is that my child, with his myriad and multi-systemic reactions came up as "not allergic."
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