Whew!

It has been quite the couple of days around here. I should start by talking about last Friday. Ugh...Caroline was at MDO (our first Friday). When I picked her up, I noticed that she had a few little red spots around her mouth. I said to her, in front of her teacher, "Caroline, why are you breaking out?" Her teacher (who is so sweet and wonderful with the kids, and knows about her food allergies), said they had pumpkin pie to celebrate Thanksgiving, but she didn't give her a piece because of her egg allergy. Well, I pack her lunch so I knew she had gotten into something. When I got her to the car and could really look at her closely, I noticed (and smelled!) that she had little pieces of pumpkin on her face. I can only assume that she grabbed a bite off of another child's plate. We immediately came up and got out the benadryl. About 30 minutes later, I went to change her diaper and check out the hives, and they were EVERYWHERE! She started basically clawing at her armpits, hips, neck, and knees. Those areas had hives about the size of my fist and were almost purple. The rest of her body was covered in smaller, red hives. I got really nervous, really quickly. I called the allergist and spoke with the nurse, who briefly put me on hold to talk to the doctor, but told me to get the epi-pen ready and plan to go to the ER. Oh man...I have never had to administer the epi-pen and I hope I never have to. The nurse got back on the line and said that if we could meet her at the hospital within 15 minutes they would check her out. Off we went!!! She screamed the entire time and was saying how bad she was itching :( Once we got there, they gave her another dose of benadryl, an epi-pen and steroids to calm things down. It was horrible. The doctor said that she had an "extensive and severe" allergic reaction. And if this is how she reacts to a bite of pie, think about what would happen if she had a whole slice, or anything else with egg in it (we didn't even talk about her nut allergy, which is worse than the egg allergy...yikes!). So, we are even more careful than ever. We never use eggs or nuts around the house and I read labels like a crazy lady, but now everyone knows why I am so obsessive over what she eats. It is such a scary experience to watch your child break out in hives all over, screaming and scratching, and her lips start to swell. It is such a feeling of helplessness, mainly for her, because she doesn't understand what is going on. Although she doesn't know what "allergic" means, if you tell her she is allergic to something, she "gets" that it will make her sick and she will no longer ask for something. So that is good! We were sent home with more steroids for 5 days. She is doing much better now, all of the swelling is gone! I dreaded having "the talk" with her teacher, but I was very nice ;) Seriously, I was. It was an accident and I understand that, but they also need to know the severity of her situation.

And...Lilly Catherine is so sick the poor baby can barely breathe. Oh my goodness!!! Yes, she is teething (two at once). But she is sick beyond that. I took her to the doctor this morning after being up with her most of the night (you know something is wrong when the child won't sleep and she has been sleeping through the night since 7 weeks!). She is so congested and coughing so much that she gags herself. :( It is the most pitiful thing I have ever seen. Next to the aforementioned hive episodes. She does have a fever, around 101, and the doctor said that if it isn't better by Friday to bring her back in. So we brought the swing up out of the basement, which she doesn't fit in very well anymore, and we are trying that tonight. She needs to be propped up as much as possible, hopefully the swing will work (in addition to my arms).

So that is our exciting week. As my wonderful grandfather (who has six children) says, "when you have children, that's all you've got." That pretty much sums up my life right now, but I sure do love it. As challenging as it is, I absolutely adore my little girls!