Sometimes you feel like a nut...

Today was a rather big day in little Abe's life. Though I haven't mentioned it here on the blog, Abe's annual check-up with our pediatric allergist resulted in some positive news. Abe's blood test showed that his RAST scores for peanut were quite low (I won't go into all the details of what a RAST score is but let's just say that it has to do with likelihood one might have an allergic reaction, or something like that, honestly it's all still confusing to us).

This was good because a) perhaps it meant that if he did accidentally ingest some sort of peanut residue he was slightly less likely to have an anaphylactic reaction (though that's not necessarily true and you can't really trust it, which is why the RAST score is rather confusing to me) and b) it rendered him eligible for a peanut challenge!

What's a peanut challenge? Well, it's where you go to the allergist and consume a clinical dose of the food you are allergic to and see if you're actually still allergic to it. If you've had any type of reaction to the food recently then you're not eligible because, duh, you know you're allergic so why put your body through a potentially dangerous situation. BUT! If you haven't had any reactions for a long time and you're scores are super low, well then, you might be able to give it a try.

So this morning was Abe's peanut challenge. AND HE PASSED.

We gave him peanut butter every fifteen minutes for a total of four dosages. Then they watched him for another two hours (yeah, our morning started at 7 am with a drive into the city and ended when we got home at nearly 3 pm) and he showed no signs of reaction. No hives, rashes, nothing.

Yeah!!!

So now we're contemplating all the formerly forbidden goodies that we had banished from our household and pretty much our lives. Peanut butter M&Ms, actually even the plain ones were off limits, PB&J sandwiches, and everything yummy in the world that contains even tree nuts because we had to avoid those for fear of machinery cross contamination.

It's a good day. Though I'm probably going to spend the next few years watching him like a hawk every time he eats anything with peanuts in it just out of latent fear that something might occur. And I'll probably always have a heavy dose of that allergy mom sensitivity inside me because I am now programmed to look at every label and ALWAYS ask other moms about allergies.

But I think that's a good thing. With the prevelance of food allergies everywhere, I don't ever want to be someone who takes this for granted. It's not an easy way to live.