It's been about a year since we started our OIT journey. There have been ups and downs, but Brendan successfully completed egg OIT and a round of tree nut food challenges. That leaves us with two pesky food allergies: peanut and hazelnut. On March 17, 2016 we began our journey to tackle those last two. The timing was perfect, really. The boys were on Spring Break, so we could spend a whole day in Dallas with nary a make up assignment to worry about. We arrived in Dallas in the early afternoon on March 16th and checked into the hotel. Memaw tagged along for the trip, and as always, she was a huge help! We decided to let the boys have a little fun swim time when we got to the hotel.
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| Silly boys with their Memaw ;). |
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| Swim Time!! |
After a couple of hours swimming, we headed out to have dinner with my bestie (who happens to live in the Dallas area). Her mom came to dinner, too, so Memaw got a chance to catch up with her. Our kiddos had a blast together as always.
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Time to say goodbye! My best friend and I have been friends since we were 7,
so these boys are more like cousins than just friends. |
After dinner, it was a quick bath and into bed. We'd have to get up EARLY the next morning to ensure that Brendan had his egg dose at least two hours before we started OIT for peanut and hazelnut. The next morning, we woke up bright and early, and I went to work making eggs in the hotel microwave. This was our first traveling egg dose, and it seemed to work out pretty well, thanks to a little egg cooker I bought on Amazon!
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| How one makes eggs in a hotel room microwave. |
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| Why, yes, that is a breakfast taco. #Texasforever |
After our in-room breakfast, we headed to the allergist's office. March 17th happened to be St. Patrick's day. We claimed it as our personal lucky day!! Brendan completed a pulmonary function test (which he ROCKED this time-- unlike last year and our little asthma flare before he started egg). Then, it was time for his doses! We started with a single MICROgram of peanut protein. The hazelnut dose was more flour, but about the same amount of protein. Every 15 minutes, they brought Brendan 2 new syringes filled with a nut/koolaid solution.
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The orange solution is hazelnut and the purple is peanut.
Brendan says the hazelnut tastes better than the peanut. |
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| The boys chilling out in between doses. |
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| Another dose in! It must not taste the best, but he was a trooper! |
After a full day of doses, Brendan went home on 5 milligrams of peanut flour (about 2 milligrams of peanut protein), and 15 milligrams of hazelnut flour (also about 2 milligrams of hazelnut protein). He took that twice a day for just over a week, and then went back to updose on Good Friday (yay for another school holiday!).
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| Back in the office for an updose. |
A week and a half later, he went back and updosed again. He's been on 15 millgrams of peanut flour and 45 milligrams of hazelnut flour (about 6 milligrams of protein for each nut) for nearly a week. By comparison, a single peanut contains between 250 and 300 milligrams of protein, so Brendan is eating about 1/50 of a peanut at this point. We head back to Dallas again tomorrow for another updose!!
This round of OIT has gone fairly smoothly so far. Brendan has had two episodes of vomiting, but both seem unrelated to his dose (once was from car sickness and the other was the day before his big state assessment, so we're chalking that one up to nerves). As a second round OIT mom, I find I'm much more relaxed than during our first round. I liken it to having your second kid. You are a complete ball of nerves with your first kid, but when the second one comes along, you're much more chill!! It is hard to believe that peanut and hazelnut are Brendan's last two allergies. Sometime this fall, as long as all goes well, Brendan will be able to eat WHATEVER he wants from ANYWHERE he wants. It is so close, we can almost taste the Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and Nutella!!!
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