Have I mentioned the time I gave my youngest daughter a brownie and almost killed her?
I handed her the treat – pilfered from high tea at a fancy hotel – as I was frantically getting ready for lunch at a friend’s place.
She started complaining her lips felt funny. I waved her away.
She started complaining her throat felt funny. I ignored her.
She started complaining that she felt sick. I dismissed it.
We jumped in the car and headed to lunch.
I could hear her scratching in the back seat and hissed at her to knock it off. She has terrible eczema and scratches herself until she bleeds.
My eldest daughter announced: “Uuummm … I think you’d better turn around and see this.”
The youngest was one giant, red hive.
She’d had a violent allergic reaction to something in the brownie. We collectively gasped and dashed to the chemist for antihistamines.
My ex called the fancy hotel and asked for a list of the ingredients in the brownie. Everything was pretty standard aside from walnuts. It had to be them. But who is allergic to walnuts?
The sensible next step would have been allergy testing, but we chose to focus on our imploding marriage instead. Negligent us.
The youngest is the vigilant type and made sure to let everyone know she had a nut allergy. She excluded all types of nuts, even her beloved pistachios, as an extra precaution.
She’s going places that little blonde dynamo.
Fast forward to Tuesday afternoon – the youngest FINALLY got her allergy test, which she’d been bugging us to book for a VERY long time.
Bizarrely, aside from being violently allergic to dust mites and horses (we also suspect cows, but they don’t have a test for that) she’s anaphylactic to walnuts and pecans.
What are the odds?
As a friend wrote on Facebook: “Only u wld have a child with obscure allergies.”
The next daunting step is epi pens and an allergy management plan for both her school and when we go on holidays.
Serious stuff.
My poor little petal.
She’s also on a six-week medication blitz for her allergic rhinitis. If that doesn’t work we’re looking down the barrel of an operation on her adenoids.
I will remain forever awed by her good humour and positivity in the face of constant discomfort.
She’s battled skin problem since she was a toddler and has never let them get her down.
I can’t wait to give her a hug.
Even relentlessly positive little blonde dynamos need hugs.
Hers are big, beautiful ones – she often vows she’ll never let me go.
Bless her.
I’m allergic to penicillin. Do you have allergies?
housegoeshome 
It is sad to read of your little one’s discomfort but amazing to hear of her resilience. I have had eczema all my life and have recently discovered something that really helps. A cook book called the Alchemy Cookbook by Nicole Azzopardi. Basically, it is about eating food that heals your gut. The best thing ever is the bone broths – I have had 2 cups of broth everyday for a week now and my skin is loving it. Just another thing to add to your list……
Wow thanks for the tip, Roz. The specialist has advised us to hit my daughter’s skin hard with ointment to clear it up and it seems to be working. But I don’t want to be reliant on it, so natural maintenance stuff will be good.
I’m allergic to iodine contrast you know the stuff they give for scans! I had a severe anaphylaxis reaction in hospital once! They were very excited! Me not so much. Good luck with the rhinitis hope you don’t need surgery xoxo
That sounds HORRIFYING
I’m allergic to penicillin too. But my dog’s allergic to almost everything. We had him allergy tested and the things he’s allergic to include cockroaches, mice faeces, ants, canary feathers and grass seeds. He’s been on a course of desensitisation injections for over six months and we’re finally starting to see some improvement.
Oh my goodness, it must be so difficult having a dog allergic to grass!!!!!