I took Kade to the allergist today (this guy books two months in advance so we’ve been waiting a long time for this). Ever since Kade was born, he has struggled with adverse reactions to different foods. The colic that plaqued him for his first year of life stemmed from a milk protein allergy. When he eats tomatoes, strawberries, peanuts, ranch dressing, ice cream and other things I can’t think of right now, he will instantly break out in a rash around his mouth followed by a nasty rash on his bum due to an even nastier filled diaper. I bit the bullet and called the allergist after he broke out in hives upon eating some shrimp…scary. A friend of mine told me about a link between milk and wheat allergies and behavior so I decided to take those items out of his diet and within two weeks, his tantrums became much more manageable and he seemed happier. I can only imagine how his belly must feel when he eats things that don’t agree with him, but because he’s felt this pain since birth, I don’t think he knew what it was like to feel “normal.” Taking the culprits out of the equation allowed him to feel relief for the first time.

The allergist did the scratch tests to Kade’s forearms. He didn’t budge, and the girl doing the testing said that she’s never seen such a brave boy (most adults even give her a hard time). He didn’t have a reaction to any of the allergens…thank goodness, and the allergist had said that he didn’t expect him to. He said we were dealing with adverse food reactions, but not allergies, which require complete avoidance and life/death situations. He said that we should avoid the foods that cause him to react, but if he does eat them, the reaction won’t send him to a hosptial (it will just require us to clean up diarrhea filled diapers for a day or so…fun). He was concerned about the dairy and shellfish issue though, so he sent us to the lab for blood testing on those (apparently a milk protein allergy won’t show up on scratch tests). Again, my little man bravely faced the needle and even watched in awe and fascination as his blood filled the two tubes. It helped that Miss Linda was so patient and gentle…and honest with Kade.

Now we wait for a week to find out the results. The doctor said that there’s no research to show a correlation between behavior and food, but if it works for us…keep doing it. I don’t think it’s that the food causes bad behavior, but it does cause gastric pain, which doesn’t make for a happy child. It’s a pain in the you know what to cut dairy out of his diet, but if it makes a difference (however slight) I will gladly do it. I’m relieved that wheat isn’t an issue because that stuff is in just about everything. Kade’s food budget was beginning to surpass my diabetes budget…and cutting into my wine and cheese budget…not so good.