looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

So my so was diagnosed with peanut and tree allergy last yr at his 2 yr apt/bloodwork

This peanut loving family was devestated but we got used to it, we still ate it and were careful around him... never had any issues..

well fast fwd a year and he (unknown to us before hand) had chicken nuggets fried in peanut oil and didn't have any reaction..We were scared at first but then got excited in hopes that he grew out of it..

So at his 3 yr apt we got allergy bloodwork done again hoping for good news...

Well we got the exact opposite. Turns out he is not only allergic to peanuts now...the list got A LOT longer:

Class 3 - Wheat
Class 3 - Peanuts
Class 2 - Maple
Class 2 - Oak
Class 2 - Eggs
Class 2 - Beef
Class 2 - Soy beans
Class 2 - Corn
Class 2 - Milk

We set up an allergist dr apt...for this coming weekend

We have soooo many questions...In the mean time - we learned there is a scale of 1-6 so in the whole scheme of things Class 2 isn't "that" bad..right?!?!

BUT WE ARE SOOO CONFUSED..

He has 2-3 sippys of milk every day.
He has wheat EVERYDAY!! He has an egg sandwich on wheat bread many mornings, has jelly sandwich on wheat bread almost every day...He could eat a whole bag of honey wheat pretzels if we let him among other things made with wheat...

He has had excema flair-ups but hasn't had one in a while..

how can he be allergic to stuff he eats every day?!?! and we not realize it...what reaction IS he having?!?!?

This list is so depressing..anyone with multi allergy children have some insight?

Thanks so much

Message edited 3/6/2012 12:13:33 PM.

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

I don't have any advice but my friend's dd is allergic to tree nuts but can eat stuff that's fried in peanut oil, too. I don't think the allergen is present in the oil.

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

I would be extremely careful about giving your son anything fried in peanut oil...Peanuts are very different from tree nuts and resemble soy more as a legume than they actually resemble tree nuts. So its a very different kind of allergy...

That said some kids can grow out of their peanut allergy but it is recommended that they have little to no exposure to ensure that this happens...Peanut oil can stay on surfaces for up to six months and needs to be cleaned with bleach...Anaphylactic reactions can happen overtime with a build up of exposure and are unpredictable...Peanuts is also an airborne allergy so just opening up a bag or smelling it can be considered exposure...My dd was on amoxicillin 2 times fine and then broke out into a rash on her 3rd time before realizing she was allergic...

This is one theory about why all the other food allergies could have been triggered...Your dc may have had a reaction to the exposure just not an anaphylactic one but the antibodies are being built up in the blood due to exposure and the immune system is fighting off other foods b/c of the build up of antibodies...So one allergy can lend itself to the immune system being put into overdrive.

Don't want to alarm you but I come from a peanut allergy family and we are super sensitive to the stuff and will move away from people even eating it...

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

thank you..

believe me...We had NO IDEA those chicken nuggets were fried in Peanut oil..if we knew that we would have never given it to him.

We were so careful up until then! He had his one and only exposure/reaction when we first found out (at 2 yrs old) that he was allergic and then never had another taste of peanut anything again!

We keep him away from all peanuts AND tree nuts bec he already does have an allergy to both (cashews, almonds, and pistachios)

I am hoping by not exposing it to him again it never gets any worse and maybe he will grow out of it

I just don't understand all the other allergies.(wheat, corn, milk, beef, etc)..we just found these out yesterday and he eats ALL of that stuff on a daily basis...

so confusing!!

Message edited 3/6/2012 3:57:52 PM.

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

DS is a little over 2 and is allergic to soy protein and soy flour but not soy oil or soy lecthin. I think it is the way stuff is processed. I know that the tests at their age aren't very reliable.

A friends son was tested after having a bad allergic reaction to Pediasure. The dr said he was severely allergic to soy, milk, all nuts, fish, eggs, and numerous other foods.. He is 6 and has been eating all of the food all of his life with no problems. They took him to another dr and retested him and they all came back negative.

Can you do the skin test next time?

Message edited 3/6/2012 8:28:12 PM.

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

My son has a list longer than that from his bloodwork. Basically, the allergist said if there are foods on it that he already tolerates (like milk/dairy) then not to worry about and keep giving it.

As for the peanut oil thing - apparently the process used to make it removes/denatures the protein that causes the allergic reaction. Personally, I haven't tried it yet, but I know several peanut allergy kids that are fine with peanut oil.

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

My son's bloodwork also came back positive for milk allergy as well as egg. We got the skin prick test done and he had no reaction. I think sometimes the bloodwork is "off".

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

i would do the prick test.. my DS blood work came back that he was allergic to EVERYTHING under the sun.

he had a low allergen to peanuts and he eats PBJ EVERYDAY (this was 2 years ago)

get a skin prick, much more accurate.

and my son is allergic to milk (not dairy) but milk as in lets have a glass of milk, but his blood work showed no such thing.

go figure

i would take his blood work with a grain of salt..

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

Sorry to hijack, which test is more accurate a blood test or scratch test?

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

most of those foods you just listed are all the foods that are GENETICALLY MODIFIED!!!!!
It is disgusting how they process the foods our kids eat these days.
Stay away from foods that GMO.

My son has issues with wheat, and especially soy, sometimes corn.
Try to get foods are organic, I know it helped a lot with my son when it came to corn chips. I stopped buying frito lay and got organic corn chips, he was able to digest it much better.

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

wow this info is all very interesting..

I am hoping that the blood test was "off" like a lot of you claim is the way with your DCs. Thank you for sharing your stories

How is the prick/skin test with a 3 yr old boy..the blood test was hard enough...I cannot imagine what the prick test will be like...


Diane - interesting what you say about organic..it does kinda make sense...but the thing is - I cannot for the life of me figure out if he truly is allergic bec we haven't experienced any reactions. So that is why I question the blood test. - the above foods are his fav foods and he consumes them every day!!

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

We did the prick test at 12 months, DS didn't even flinch. He was tested for 16 different things at one time. A blood test was never offered to us.

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

Posted by jlk51496

wow this info is all very interesting..

I am hoping that the blood test was "off" like a lot of you claim is the way with your DCs. Thank you for sharing your stories

How is the prick/skin test with a 3 yr old boy..the blood test was hard enough...I cannot imagine what the prick test will be like...


Diane - interesting what you say about organic..it does kinda make sense...but the thing is - I cannot for the life of me figure out if he truly is allergic bec we haven't experienced any reactions. So that is why I question the blood test. - the above foods are his fav foods and he consumes them every day!!

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

UGH! It never ends!!!! Sometimes food allergies give people gas or diarrhea...maybe level 2 isn't strong enough to give him a reaction. So weird that it is most of the stuff he eats regularly. I hope the tests are "off" like other posters have said or he grows out of it

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

We did the bloodwork for my son and he came back with a slew of alergies, just like your list....I was beside myself,,,I knew about the dairy (that's the reason we got him tested) but like you we had wheat on there (how do you avoid wheat?!) he's been eating wheat all the time...along with soy/peanut/walnut/...anyway I still haven't tried any peanut/walnut stuff with him b/c I'm terrified of him having a reaction. He is 2 1/2 yrs old, still had never had milk or cheese...he does tolerate yogurt though (weird I know) The test itself was absolutely awful so I really don't want to go through anything like that again. I don't understand it and my Ped seems to take it lightly...but honestly I do notice when he has yogurt...and wheat stuff well what he has most of the time...he has loose bm and that's quite often (sorry tmi) so I'm thinking his body can tolerate but has issue digesting it

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

Posted by jlk51496

wow this info is all very interesting..

I am hoping that the blood test was "off" like a lot of you claim is the way with your DCs. Thank you for sharing your stories

How is the prick/skin test with a 3 yr old boy..the blood test was hard enough...I cannot imagine what the prick test will be like...


Diane - interesting what you say about organic..it does kinda make sense...but the thing is - I cannot for the life of me figure out if he truly is allergic bec we haven't experienced any reactions. So that is why I question the blood test. - the above foods are his fav foods and he consumes them every day!!

Re: looking for some explanations for son's allergies..

OK -- we have had a similar situation happen to us.

When DD was young we lived in an apartment and came to my FIL's house to do laundry on the weekend. He always had vanilla sandwich cookies in the pantry. When she was about 18 months old I gave her one while I was throwing the wash in. When I came back into the living room her mouth and hand were all red. I took the cookie away from her and checked the package and realized that it was a peanut butter sandwich cookie --- Pathmark brand so it was circular and looked just like the vanilla one, not shaped like a Nutter Butter, so I hadn't realized.

We called the pediatrician. He recommended that we give her benadryl and observe her, and we did so and the redness went down. When we went in for a followup he said that allergies can come and go before 5-6 so we should wait for then to get her allergy tested.

This year, at 6, he gave us a script to have bloodwork done. I was expecting to confirm the peanut allergy. She hasn't had peanuts since. Part of me was hoping that the allergy had gone away. After a traumatic bloodwork experience (Will never go to that blood draw place again!) the doc called us a few days later to give us the LIST of what she is allergic to!

Corn
Milk
Orange
Peanuts
Soy Beans
Tomato
Wheat



He refered me to an allergist (Who I LOOOOVE BTW, Dr. Irene Peck in East Meadow) and we had the skin test done at the allergist.

They tested her for 34 things using the skin prick test and everything came up positive aside for 2 things. She is NOT allergic to mold or dogs. She IS allergic to every single tree pollen, every single grass pollen, cats, all of the above foods, and all tree nuts.

We spoke at great length with Dr. Peck about what all of these food allergies mean. She drinks milk daily and eats cheese and yogurt on a regular basis. She's not a tomato eater but loves ketchup and has it often. She eats bread, baked goods, pasta, etc all the time. She loves orange juice and clementines. She is also asthmatic andhad her first asthma attack when she was 9months old. She has taken asthma meds since 9months old (pulmicort daily and albuterol as a rescue med)

I asked if the allergies are causing her asthma. They said that it was inconclusive since we have a strong family history of asthma. She may have developed it anyway. Her allergies do, most likely, cause the increase in her symptoms in the fall and spring. That is when she gets sick and ends up needing extra meds. They don't think the bulk of her food allergies are an issue. SHe tollerates many of the foods she is allergic to just fine. She is not failing to thrive, she is tall and a good weight for her height ... she's bigger then many of her friends because she's so tall and has a few inches on all of them. They said if the things like wheat and dairy were a real problem she wouldn't be developing as well as she is. She's super smart, an incredible reader reading at about a year and a half above grade level, she is not developing poorly because of eating foods that she is supposedly "allergic" to.

They did say that the peanut allergies and tree nut allergies are a different story. They do not want me to try and introduce them sicne we've kept them from her for so long. The reactions to peanuts and tree nuts are more severe and can cause anaphalactic shock (sp?) They gave me a double prescription for epi pens --- one to keep at home and one to keep at school. I keep that, along with her inhaler, in my over-stuffed purse at all times just in case although I've never given her the epi pen and we use the inhaler very rarely.

See what the allergist says about all of the food allergies. I feel confident in what our allergist said about her being OK with most of the foods.

Please keep us posted and good luck, FM me if you need to since we are in much of the same situation!

Message edited 3/8/2012 6:58:39 AM.