Adding more stress to the week

As if having a flood in the basement wasn't enough, we also made a trip to the ER on Wednesday!!

I fed Micah a strawberry, banana smoothie (using rice milk) and almost right away, the area around his mouth starting turning red and he was starting to get hives on his forehead.

This all kind of went away, so I let it be, but I noticed that his eyes were also red and a little swollen.

I went on with my day, but he would not settle down. He was up at 4:45 that morning, so I assumed he was just tired and fighting it. He hadn't been taking very good naps, so I thought it was just something we had to get through until he finally fell asleep.

About 10, I finally decided that I could not teach school and deal with such a fussy baby, so I put him in the stroller and took him outside. Sometimes a nice walk helps him to get to sleep.

This worked for a little bit, but after awhile, he just kept screaming! I didn't know what to do anymore with this boy!

I stopped pushing him and went around to pick him up. I noticed right away that his cheeks were bright red and there were hives on the back of his neck. I then noticed that his chin was swollen. I ran him back to the house and told the kids that we were going to the ER!! I know that swelling around the neck causes kids to stop breathing and I did NOT want that to happen.

I have never seen my kids get into the car so fast AND without any fighting! I buckled Micah into his carseat and headed down Dodge Street towards Children's Hospital.  Micah was full force screaming at this point and every time he quieted down, I told the kids to irritate him to keep him screaming. I figure if he was screaming, I knew he was breathing!

Once we got to Children's, I set him on the desk and said, "My baby is having an allergic reaction!!" A nurse came out right away and listened to his lungs. I think she weanted to know if he needed an epi pen. His lungs sounded fine, but they still got us back to a room right away. (I have never gotten taken back so quickly before!!) The doctor came in shortly after and ordered some Benadryl to take it down.  The nurse said his lungs were clear and he was not wheezing, so we didn't have to worry about that anymore.

About twenty minutes later, they brought him some Benadryl and he CRASHED hard!

He slept in my lap for over an hour.

During this time, Matt took the kids over to Pepperjax to get lunch. (I called him at work and he came to Children's too). He then brought me back some too. :)

The doctor kept coming in to check on him. The hives were getting darker the longer we sat there. When Matt and the kids came back from lunch, they actually said he looked worse.

 His rash was where his eczema always breaks out, near his sweat glands. They were around his diaper line, belly button, armpits, even on his hands and feet.

Eventually the doctor came in and said it was atopic dermatitis and insisted that he touched something. I said, "Um, ok" and let it be. I knew very well that he did not touch anything and that it was probably from the banana strawberry smoothie I made for breakfast.

We were home by about 2:15 pm. I think we arrived at the hospital around 11 am.

Here we are wake and ready to go home.

I took him to see his pediatrician yet that night and she said that yes, they were definitely hives (even thought he ER doctor said they weren't) and to keep him on antihistamines for a couple of days. She said it was definitely an allergic reaction to something and we ended up taking blood for an allergy test.  She was more helpful than the ER doctor! By about 5 that night, they hives had faded quite a bit.

She also told me to go back off of all the foods that I had reintroduced into my diet in the last two months. She said it was probably just a combination of everything.

Here we are the next morning, not so red and happy!

Those anti-histamines work great! It is totally clearing up his eczema!