Do NoT ToUcH!

On facebook's IM yesterday, a friend politely inquired as to how things were going with Kyleigh's food allergies, though she had no idea how ironic that question was! I was in the middle of a couple things, so I continued to chat with her but didn't include this story. So Summer, if you're reading, here's an example of us dealing with Kyleigh's allergies!

We're aware of one moderate and two severe food allergies for Kyleigh, which are oats, wheat/gluten, and dairy, ingredients in pretty much everything! Kyleigh's diet is under control, she doesn't really have any issues with the foods she's been eating for some time now, but Chris and I haven't fully changed over our diet to match hers and Kyleigh does sometimes have reactions to the foods Chris and I eat even though she doesn't eat those things.

How's that possible, you ask?

You know how all moms do that thing where we clean our kid by licking our finger and rubbing off whatever gunk is on their face? Well, I learned some time ago that if I eat ice cream then lick my finger to clean something off her face even as long as 30 min. later, Kyleigh will get a rash on her face and neck as a reaction to the dairy from my tongue touching her skin. That's how sensitive she is! So we are very careful and constantly mindful about what she comes in contact with!

Well, on Sunday I'd made brownies and Chris was snacking on one while he cooked a late dinner of chicken enchiladas (it's one of our faves from the e-mealz.com menu, and take note that it involves tortillas). Like I said, it was a late dinner compliments of Chris's crazy job, so it was approx. 8pm and Kyleigh was about to go to bed. She'd been running around and playing with her daddy, acting just fine while I was entertaining Siah. Then we noticed her rub her eyes, which is a common thing for toddlers to do at bedtime. Her skin looked splotchy, though, which we know is warning that something isn't quite right. We waited a while longer, it didn't worsen, so we thought she was fine to get to bed at 8:30pm. Typically she goes to bed with no fuss, sleeps all night, wakes joyfully. Not this night. After a few minutes I checked on our hysterically-screaming daughter, and this is what I found:

Her right eye was swelling shut, plus there was other swelling and red splotches on her face. All we could figure is that, although he'd washed his hands, Chris had handled both a brownie and tortillas around the time they played together, and perhaps she acquired some residue on her hands then unknowingly rubbed her eyes with it. Unbelievable! We gave her a dose of Benadryl and let her stay up and read some books so we could note her progress. When we saw improvements, she finally got to go to bed!

Yesterday morning I checked on her, and this is what I found:

Most of the swelling and most of the splotches were gone. After breakfast I gave her one more dose of Benadryl and we went on about our day as usual. She had great improvement quickly and was back to her happy-camper self in no time!

Our sweet girl is such a trooper!