We’ve known since birth that L is allergic to milk and soy, but with the onset of some recent food aversions we really wanted a complete, concrete picture of what he still is and is no longer allergic to.
We met with a pediatric immunologist and for the quickest results we agreed to a few panels of skin tests, which involved a small game of “prick the skin and measure the welts”. Since we got out of bed on the lucky side that morning, we were greeted in the testing room by Angry Standoffish Uncommunicative Nurse Lady. The dirty black oil her heart pumped apparently got in the way of performing the tests properly, and we were initially told he had one hell of a rice allergy and we should run home and throw out our entire fridge’s stock of rice milk (the last milk substitute he was allowed to drink). They also claimed he was no longer even slightly allergic to cow’s milk, so we scheduled a tolerance test called a “milk challenge”, which is surprisingly not at all related to Double Dare with Marc Summers.
We hadn’t quite made it back to the returns desk at Hippie Whole Foods when we got the phone call that Angry Lady read the test upside down or sideways, and for safety’s sake we should just repeat the tests, on their dime.
The corrected results showed violent allergies to milk, eggs, soy, peanuts, and beef. All I could think of when I saw his back was the fistfight joke from our parents’ generation, “Boy, if that’s what Panel A looks like, I’d hate to see the other guy”.
Though the peanut allergy is cause for alarm, what spooked us more was the doctor’s comment that the projectile vomiting and hives that went along with his severe milk allergy were most likely an anaphylactic reaction and we’re lucky nothing more deadly serious happened.
Aside from the more obvious detriments to having potentially fatal allergies, this also means we’re doomed to years of misunderstandings with well meaning people trying to relate, where we have to explain that no, their husband’s plumber who is lactose intolerant is not in the same situation as our son with an off the wall milk allergy and no, fatal anaphylaxis is not the same as a bad case of the farts.
E and I had joked for years that with our respective ailments and horrific allergies, we should consider never having children, never actively polluting the gene pool with such obvious disdain. We never dreamed that our jokes would come half-true, and our diaper bag would be filled with hypoallergenic stuffed toys and Epipens.
Three months with no updates has felt like an eternity. Between all the food feeding, poop scooping, day care driving, and rerun episodes of Yo Gabba Gabba, the Internet had all but disappeared.
Liam is now eighteen months old, and trying to either disassemble or climb on everything he sees. I keep my camera ready, looking for those rare quiet moments.
In April our friends planned an Easter egg hunt for the kiddos. After looking upon individual eggs with wonder, and giving all his eggs to mommy to make sure she had enough, he wound up with very few himself.
Though he inherited my horrible allergies, his newfound love du jour seems to be slobbery dog kisses. We finally brought in the big guns and let the lawn service conquer the backyard jungle, so it’s quite the little place to run around now. The pup pups are enamored with him, and tolerate even the most awkward of ear tugs and tail pulls.
L’s other newfound love is the telephone. Every ring elicits a loudly yelled “MAMA!!”, no doubt having had the phone associated with E’s evening calls to home during late work nights. Though we continually position the phone out of reach, he continually finds chairs to push over to the high table and scoots himself up to fiddle with the buttons and call people from the saved phone number directory. At one point we caught him having successfully started dialing “011 44″ followed by not much of anything on his part as we quickly snatched the phone away.
But no matter what destruction befalls our home by his hand, every night when he sleeps our twenty four hour amnesia kicks in, and to us he reverts back to being just our pure, angelic little munchkin.
Speaking of fickle weather, a few days after the snow melted, Dallas saw some gorgeous weather up in the low sixties. I took L outside for a walk while E had a few go-rounds with the camera.
Though my idea of a walk is the standard cinematic father and son mosey down the sidewalk with some rock kicking and the occasional stumble, L is more inclined to tear ass down the street as soon as his feet leave the lawn and hit pavement. Half the time the walk is more of a chase, and what appears to be a comforting hug on film is more a grab and lift in the case of approaching traffic.
E got me over my phobia of being too far from the front door by going and actually locking it, so I agreed to roll down to the park for some swings and slides. We hit the mulch and L nearly forgot he had parents.
At first we thought the swings would be innocent enough, but after placing L in the swing in the correct direction he somehow found a way to make it weird and uncomfortable. He refused to sit up, and just drooped his limbs down like dead weight and leaned his head over the edge pointing everything straight down like a dead sack of potatoes.
Finally we turned him around in the swing so he was sitting backwards, the higher back portion of the swing under his armpits. He straightened up a bit and gave us some high fives.
As soon as we freed him of the swing’s shackles, he made a beeline for the slides. He was able to climb most of the stairs himself (under supervision), and took to the smaller slide like a fish in water.
Just as suddenly as he lit up at the idea of the park, he was done. He gave us the big adios, and tried to tear ass across the park to wherever it was he thought he was going.
Just out of frame, of course, is E giving chase.
As New Yorkers, we never get used to the fickle Texas weather. Last week it went from sixty degrees and sunny, to below thirty and snowing. When all was said and done, we received twelve inches of snow in a twenty-four hour period.
Having been let out from work early to get home safely, I picked up L from daycare and went home to the warm house. We played in the living room for most of the afternoon, but I couldn’t resist bundling him up for a few minutes outside in what was then roughly six to seven inches of snow.
He stomped around with big stomps for a few minutes, made it all the way down to the sidewalk and back onto the front lawn, before the fun ended and he started getting cold and uncomfortable.
He at least managed to avoid the yellow snow left against the base of our trees by the neighborhood dogs, for which I am quite thankful.
The week before Christmas it was a balmy sixty-something degrees in Dallas. My mother and sister flew in to spend the holidays with us. One afternoon we took L for a walk around the block since the weather was so nice. He ran around the sidewalk, which more resembled fast hobbling with some arm flailing thrown in.
Christmas Eve brought not only a whopping Texas blizzard sized half inch of snow, but also nausea and lots of vomiting for one and all. Apparently L had picked up a stomach bug when he went to the doctor for his bilateral ear infections, and gave us the ultimate Christmas present. The only one who wasn’t sick was E, we’re presuming that’s because her stomach is made of hate, and not even bacteria can live in such an environment.
One of the more fantastic things about a tree with sharp needles is that it has built-in baby deterrents. Anytime L put his hand on any of the branches, he’d automatically yank it back and walk away in disgust. Finally he realized he could at least steal a candy cane off one of the lower branches, and figured the best way to eat it was with the plastic on. That got deep-sixed with the quickness.
We finished decorating the tree and wrapping all the presents at two in the morning, as is customary last-minute fashion for our family. E suggested I snap a photo of the tree with everything laid out and peaceful, before the morning comes and L declares war on anything wrapped.
Morning finally came, and in between vomits L cautiously crept his way through the stack of presents not really knowing what to make of any of it. We helped him unwrap a few, and he again trotted around flailing his arms and throwing the wrapping paper into big piles.
He finally calmed down enough to brave the big red doggie, and giggled as we hopped the blue one around while making barking noises.
Whether or not he fully appreciated all that was Christmas, we still had a lot of fun watching him and listening to his squeals and cackles of laughter.
Last Tuesday, E decided it was time for L to undertake the rite of passage every child embarks on during the first memorable Christmas holiday of their lives. It was time to meet Santa.
She dolled up L in his proper little dress shirt and bow tie, and let him run around the bedroom while she got ready to bring him down to Santa’s Workshop.
Unfortunately, L didn’t realize that when he continues to pull the caps off the toilet screws in the bathroom, each “NO” will get progressively louder, and will be eventually followed by a smack on the hand. He crumpled into a little pile on the bathroom floor to show how horrible and dreadful it was to be reprimanded.
I did not go down to see Santa with them, so unfortunately all I received are two pieces of information secondhand: Everyone loved L and his bowtie, and L hated, hated, hated Santa.
It took us all of four seconds after the artificial tree debacle to pendulum swing all the way back to wanting a real tree. E said she knew of a tree lot near our house, so last night we packed up the car and headed over there.
After walking around and taking in that fantastic tree smell for awhile, we took a walk through their tacky “Spray-Snow Winter Wonderland” room just for giggles.
We always have a a huge crisis of conscience when buying a real tree in Texas. Being New Yorkers, our dead parents would spin in their graves if they knew we spent more than $50 on a tree. So we walked past the $300 six foot trees up front, and asked for their Charlie Brown section. We’ve had luck doing that previously, I’m always surprised what constitutes a “reject” tree in some people’s minds.
As we turned the corner to Budget Row, we were greeted by some of the tallest, most full and beautiful trees on the lot, for a fraction of the price of the others. We asked the lot guy what could possibly be wrong with these and he said, “A lot of people don’t like them because the needles are stiff.” Anyone who has hung an ornament on a Christmas tree knows that stiffer needles keep the hooks on better, so we laughed and shelled out a comparatively miniscule amount of money. The total price wound up being 35% of what we paid for the fake the week before.
When we got home and got the tree in the house, I grabbed the Sawzall and lopped off a few of the bottom branches to give me enough trunk to get it into the base.
Though we can’t know for certain what L thinks about the tree until he starts talking, we’d like to think that the smile on his face last night meant that he knew this tree was super fantastic and the other one sucked big ass balls. After he touched it a few times and stared at it, we’re certain the “stiff needles” will probably be one deterrent to him mucking with the tree.
Then, as quickly as the day passed, it was suddenly time for bed.
L started daycare a month ago, and was sick within two days. Since then he’s been ill twice more, each time with bilateral ear infections, vomiting, and enough dripping mucus to flypaper the kitchen at a fast food joint. This afternoon, daycare called and (big shocker) he had a 103.5 fever, was hoarse and congested.
The poor munchkin has been asleep since we got home from the pediatrician. Alternating Children’s Tylenol and Motrin has brought his fever down to a high-normal 99.1, but he’s still miserable and tired.
I suppose this is how it goes. So begins the rite of passage children embark on when beginning their exposure to other children. We can either embrace it, or buy extra steel wool to scrub him with on his way into his car seat. Either way, it will last as long as it lasts.
It’s been great messing with the new camera since it’s arrived in the post. With help and recommendations from friends, I was able to start shooting all manually, and have been pleased with the results. I scored a manual focus non-metering 50mm f/1.8 prime lens from the 1970s on eBay for $26, and shooting photos with that has been a lot of fun. With everything set manually, it’s been a hell of a lot easier to get non-blurry photos of L and the animals.
It’s been a little over a month since I’ve last posted, and with good reason, everything’s gotten hectic.
E was brought on board at a great job, which means L went into daycare. Though he is benefiting greatly from socializing with other kiddos, it’s still extremely difficult to leave him in anyone else’s care after being by his side every day for a little over a year.
Having someone else deal with his allergies has always been a big worry, he’s very sensitive to a wide variety of food ingredients. The first day he was in daycare, despite us bringing particular things to eat and stressing the importance of his diet, he somehow wound up with a cheese cracker and a subsequent rash on his face. We luckily equipped them with Benadryl and a dosing chart, so he wound up okay. It was, however, enough to freak us both out and make us second guess everything.
He’s become a very, very happy little guy. He’s accumulated a medium sized arsenal of toys, and runs around the house with a few of them causing mayhem and destruction. He’s figured out how to open the latches on the dog food container, the result of which should be self-explanatory (as should the need for heavy items on top of the dog food container from then on). Since the day he entered daycare, we’ve taken to bathing him every night to get the cooties off, and he loves every second of it.
We’ve tossed around the idea of having him sit for some portraits recently, and just can’t bring ourselves to do it. Though it would be great to have a nice photo or two of him, as hardcore DIY people we can’t justify spending a few hundred dollars per sitting for a one-off. We decided it would be better to take what we would spend on a photographer, and buy a DSLR camera. We got a deal on a Nikon D40 that we simply could not pass up. This way, we won’t just have a photographer’s perfect photo of him once a year or less, we’ll have great photos of him frequently throughout his whole early life.
