Food Can Kill!

About a month ago my daughter went to see a new allergist, and he suggested doing a new Skin test for allergies to identify exactly what she was allergic to. To all of our surprise peanuts were not one of them. Peanuts actually are not tree-nuts, but rather are closely related to the legumes, or beans.

Peanut allergic people can often eat tree nuts and tree nut allergic people can often take peanuts. However, some individuals may be allergic to both. In addition, you can be allergic to some but not all tree nuts. Almond seems to cause the least problems of all common tree nuts.

Unfortunately her allergy to cashews is so severe, that a few hours after we had left the doctor's office we had to rush to the Emergency Room. Her arm swelled up bigger than her leg, and turn beet red, and she was in excruciating pain.

Then I remembered that a few years ago when she was in High School, one of her friends gave her a candy to try from India. It contain cashews or a combinations of different nuts, I not sure, she took a bit and after swallowing a small portion she notice almost right away that something was wrong. She ran to the nurse's office. They called my wife to come pick her up because she was vomiting and crying in pain. She picked her up and while driving home called 911 and me at work, because of how bad she was getting.

The paramedics met them at the house and immediately got to work to save her live. Her reaction was so bad that her life was in danger. I got home within 15 to 20 minutes, and saw my child on lying on the sofa looking very fragile with an IV, oxygen, and paramedics and police all around. My living room literally looked like an army MASH unit.

Thank God for the quick response of everyone involved, and for the fact that she always carries an EpiPen. I cannot stress enough, how important it is to be prepared. If you have a child with any food allergies, no matter how mild, get prepared. Learn as much as you can about the food, they symptoms, and what you need to do in an emergency.