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This is it.  The Peanut “Solution”.     Because I spend a dutiful amount of time thinking about things like the word ‘solution’,  I find it somewhat…perplexing.

so·lu·tion

noun \sə-ˈlü-shən\

• An answer to a problem.

• An act or the process by which a solid, liquid, or gaseous substance is homogeneously mixed with a liquid or sometimes a gas or solid.

Ummm, ok.  So here’s how I think about this:

This is NOT a solution because a solution doesn’t need to be shaken.  A solution is, as stated above, a homogenous mixture – already evenly incorporated with no agitation required.   This bottle clearly states, “Please Shake Well Before Using”.  For those of us in medicine, we call that a suspension.  Yes, you know I overthink everything.  Particularly with my background.

So, what does that leave me with?

It’s a solution.  It’s an answer to a problem.  Yessss, that’s how I see it, and then I get scared and start begging God to please let this work.  Please help my boy.

Because sometimes this is all very scary.

Forever Changed

For the last five years, I’ve only spoken about my son’s nut allergy as an experience frozen in time.  After all, his last *real* reaction was five years ago.  It was so frightening that I don’t relive it often.  But I can.  I can summon the memory like it was yesterday.

He ate a teeny Reese’s Peanut Butter cup at my Mom’s, started itching, asked for water, then said he didn’t feel well.  He wanted to watch the cars go by on her street.  He was just barely 3.  That was November 3, 2007.

Knowing something was wrong, she called me to come get him.  I did.  He fell asleep on the way home.  It takes around 5 minutes or less to get home.  He usually looked for certain *landmarks* along the way.  Not that day.  Something was wrong.

I watched him sleep because I had already *thought* for over a year that he was allergic to peanuts.  As he slept, his abdomen swelled considerably.  I took his pants off.

At this point in the story, I feel like I’m watching a scary movie.  You know the kind.  The lights won’t turn on and the girl still opens the door/climbs the stairs/yells “Helloooo?”,  and goes into a dark room…or outside…or in the basement.  You KNOW something’s going to happen to her.  She’s a complete idiot, totally oblivious, and proceeds to meet her doom.

I can only say this; I was in denial.  Looking back, I knew exactly what was happening.  I can’t believe I did nothing at that point.   I want to scream at myself to wake him up, to call 911, to get help.  Instead, I let him finish his nap thinking it might go away.

I picked him up from my mother’s at 5:20pm.  It was now 7:30pm.

Long nap.

When he woke up, he called for me to come get him (I was already there.) and I carried him out to rock him in the chair.  Almost instantly, he got down out of the chair and started to walk behind it when he screamed and fell to the floor.  He was screaming something about his legs hurting.  I couldn’t really understand him.  He was hysterical.  I could see that his legs were blotchy and red.  It was 7:45pm.  My husband was just coming in from work and we drove him to the urgent care center.  At this point, he was sneezing, had a runny nose, and swollen red lips.  His breath was….wrong.  It smelled metallic…not bloody, metallic.  Anaphylaxis.

When we got there, we ran in to the front desk….

Receptionist: “Please sign in and someone will be with you shortly…”

Me: “NO!  My son ate peanuts!  He’s having a reaction.”

Receptionist: “OK, come on back.  I’ll get the doctorS.”

No chart.  3 Nurses.  2 Doctors.  3 shots.

Doctor: “Hold him tight, Momma.”

Doctor: “Here it comes.”

Shot number 1.

Blood curdling scream.

Doctor: “Hold him, Momma. Keep him still.”

Shot 2, and another scream.

And another shot.

And another scream.

I’m crying as much as my buddy at this point.

I didn’t want to ask if he was going to die because I didn’t want to scare him.  I asked if everything was ok.  The doctor just said, “I’m not sure.”

Because there was no time to pull a chart…All doses and times given were written on that flimsy, crackly parchment-like paper that covers that horribly insensitive bed.  The bed that doesn’t want you there.    And yes, at this point, I was mad that the bed was ridiculously uncomfortable.  It should have been helpful and soft.   After all, if my sweet, scared little boy has to lay on it for hours, it better love him as much as I do.  Everyone and everything better love him as much as I do.

My Mom came.   She felt guilty.  Horribly guilty.  She walked my buddy back and forth, back and forth, as he breathed through his teeny swollen mouth.  I walked, and rocked air…or myself, maybe.  I had to rock something because she needed to hold him for a while.  They’re very, very close.

Slowly, but surely, he improved.  As he got better, I got better.

My husband made glove balloons.

2 hours and 40 minutes later, we went home.

We were all never the same.

Life Now

After the *event*, we rearranged our lives.

No birthday parties.

No trips to amusement parks where they routinely roast nuts…you know, those nut cart things?  Ugh, no one eats those anyway.  I mean, really.  If given a choice between a greasy corndog and a bag of nuts, I’m goin’ corndog.  I bet you are, too.  The only person I recall ever buying nuts from a cart was a man celebrating Oktoberfest in July.   No doubt this is why I remember, but still. I don’t remember seeing anyone paying at one of those carts OR carrying a bag of nuts around.  Ever.

Anyhoo, we don’t go to the grocery store on the days they bake peanut butter cookies.

We homeschool.  Our school will only give him a separate table.  As I may have mentioned before, he had a reaction at 2pm when a girl whispered in his ear.  She had Reese’s cereal for breakfast at 8am.  No thanks.  It wasn’t a risk I was willing to take, and I didn’t want anyone else to be responsible for him.  It’s a lot to understand, and I often say, “If you don’t live it, you don’t get it.”  And that’s true.

And all of this is ok with me.  I don’t question why things happen.  I know it’s all part of God’s plan.  No really, I’m crazy ok with it.  I’m not a negative person.  I don’t blame anyone – myself…or God…or whatever, for this.  It just is, and we will find a way to move forward. What else matters, anyway?

Answered Prayers?

For the last several years, I’ve been in contact with researchers at Duke University, and now the University of North Carolina, where they actively study and try to cure food allergies.   After much consultation, my husband and I had nearly decided that I was going to move to North Carolina with our son to start an experimental Oral Immunotherapy Treatment (OIT).   Yes, it’s experimental.  That means lots of things…mostly, it’s allowing yourself to be a test subject in order to reach a cure.  I have moral and ethical issues with that.  While I appreciate the necessity of test subjects, I do not agree with the use of children as such.  It is necessary, I understand, but I cannot overcome my own personal compass.  Not judgement.  I just couldn’t do it.  Too much can go wrong.  I would only have allowed him to participate in additional trials of an already proven method.

Enter an Angel 

Last year, a fellow allergy Mom mentioned a doctor doing OIT in Michigan.  In West Bloomfield.  Now, if you don’t live in Michigan, this means nothing to you.  That’s why I’ve made this nifty map for you!  See that?  He’s right in our back yard. Literally.

We spoke with him last July, and planned to start the treatment.  As it approached, I was so afraid to feed my son peanuts at home that I just couldn’t go through with it.  To top it off, my son didn’t feel comfortable with it, so we decided to wait six months or so.

Several weeks ago, I decided to schedule a new appointment for the end of March. After all, I knew people whose children were in the program, and were *cured*.   Now, that is not a word ANYONE short of the mothers and children who have gone through this program will use.  It is not yet approved as a standard treatment.   It is not considered curative.  At the same time, tolerance to peanuts is increased.  The children who have completed the program are able to eat them and nothing happens.

Nothing.

I still can’t imagine it.

The Solution

We started the program on April 9th.

I was petrified.  A complete disaster that day.  My buddy seemed…calm.

Every 15 minutes he was given a grape flavored peanut solution…suspension…starting at 9am.  He made it until mid afternoon.  He started feeling strange – scared, and had a lump in his throat.  We stopped.  He was given Benadryl, and the reaction ended.

I had no idea what would happen.  I was sure he was going to react again hours later, but he didn’t.

The next morning it was my turn.  I drew up 2ml in the syringe and gave it to him.  Zantac for me.  Peanut suspension for him.  No kidding.

He reacted, and felt sick.  Benadryl.

We started giving him applesauce for the stomach cramps – which works WONDERS for him.  It didn’t stop the reactions though…of course.  The same thing happened that night, and again the next morning.

After consulting with his doctor, PTSD was added as a diagnosis.  The reactions were making him panicky.  He asked me repeatedly if he was going to die.  I promised him he would not.  I’ve never ONCE shown that kind of unwavering conviction about anything as a mother, but he desperately needed that strength.   It was not mine though, I assure you.

Then a miracle, nothing happened with the next dose.    No Benadryl.

He has only needed a single dose of Benadryl from April 12th through today.

The dose that made him react in the doctor’s office on the first day was his dose last week.

This week, he doubled that dose.

Tomorrow, he’ll increase again.

If he doesn’t react, it will be his new dose.  If he does react, we continue with the current dose for another week, and try again.  And try, and try again.

And now, I’m starting to believe.

This IS the solution.

Oh please, God, please help my boy.

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