Allergic to..........

Well folks, it's done.

This morning we took little Nicholas in for his allergy skin test and let me tell you, he did wonderful, yes he was not happy while it was happening and did say OW twice but overall, he was great.

I think it's true what they say, it's always harder on the parents, we're the ones sitting there going "Oh Oh, needles near my child, can we NOT do this?"  But we also know when we have to step back and let it happen because the outcome far outweighs the short period of uncertainty.

Now I know a lot of you are familiar with the test, I on the other hand wasn't,  so I took pictures.  Of course.  Mainly because Nicholas actually asked me to so he could see what his back looked liked, but I also thought, hey if I'm there and I have a camera, I can blog about it later and maybe put another parent's mind at ease or give them an idea of what to expect?



They start by wiping the back down and writing all these different numbers on it.  There are 50 things that he is tested for, so 50 needles that need to be poked on his skin.



They try to do 5 at a time, but with the little kids it's harder, especially on the lower back, so they have to do individual ones too.  The only time he really said it hurt ws when they were doing it near his spine and that's understandable, we know how painful and sensitive that area is.



And then the waiting begins.  15 minutes we have to wait and see what happens, he is not allowed to itch, I think that was the hardest part for him.



I know it looks awful but truly, it looks worse than it is.  Call me crazy but seeing some of those actually react and turn bright red brought me some relief.   It's awful to think that your child may be allergic to something but you have no idea what and really I didn't want to walk out of there knowing nothing and being right back where we began.



He got to color in and hang out while we waited it out and then just like that the 15 minutes were up.

The next step is for the nurse to take a little glass slide and go in and measure the hives. 



So when all is said and done, he actually didn't do too bad at all, wasn't allergic to too many things, unfortunately some of the things he IS allergic to are things that are all around us on this base and it now explains why he hasn't been doing that great since we moved to Arizona from Idaho.


What he is allergic to:

Red Alder Trees
Mesquite Trees - which are all over this base and of which we will have one in our new house backyard
Palm Trees - which are all over this base too and which we have two of in the front yard of the new house
Burning Bush Weed
Lambs Quarters Weed
Pigweed/Careless Mix Weed
Cockroaches Mix

Of all those, the cockroaches just grossed me out...UGH.

He prescribed him Nasonex and I guess we'll be using that when he's showing the allergy symptoms.

It is kinda hard in a way, at least we know what to expect but our new house down the street has both trees in the front and back yards which is going to make it very hard for him to be comfortable.  Guess he can't play out back and he can't play out front LOL

We'll see if we can get a different house but if not, we'll make do and treat the allergy symptoms, as it is we're just hoping for orders out of here even sooner than later.  

I'm just glad that everything is over and done with