Itchy and Scratchy

Yesterday Tylyn received her food patches. I had taken a trip to Wegmans the day before and spent my lunch raiding the bulk food aisle. Luckily for us they also have an extensive natural food section which led me to hitting a jackpot with freeze dried fruits. In the bulk section the fruits are loaded with Red40 and sodium benzoate (a preservative) that many people are allergic to. For my samples I needed to be as scientific as possible.

Armed with baggies and a mortar and pestle, I went to work grinding up my foods.

Grinding up foods on my lunch hour

For fruits I had chosen:

Apples

Bananas

Strawberries

Blackberries

Raspberries

Blueberries

Not knowing what exactly the Allergist’s office had I also chose:

Peanuts

Oats

Sesame seeds

Almonds

Sunflower seeds

Needles to say I had my work cut out for me but soon I had our own little collection of packets.



Food Samples for APT testing



On Tuesday I sent her off to the doctor’s with Dan and our samples. In addition the allergy nurse added:

Wheat Flour

Rice Flour

Milk Powder

Cornmeal

Soy

Egg White

Also due to my request for seafood they also did SPT for: Crab, Trout, Salmon, Lobster, Clam, Tuna, Shrimp, Perch, and Oyster. Surprise, surprise- negative.

When Tylyn came home I found out why they consider the test so technique dependent. Instead of the small chambers I posted as little example in my previous blog, Tylyn’s were about the size of a dime. The aluminum vessels were not contained in an adherent tape either, by 4pm hers was already coming undone after an afternoon of lounging on the couch.

To my dismay I saw ground sesame seeds that had fallen and were now swimming around inside the loose tape. We immediately bought some breathable athletic tape and replaced the curling paper tape.

After a trip to the school to hear about Tylyn next adventure in Disney next spring with the band and chorus, we returned home. It was in this time that Tylyn made me aware that three particular spots were bothering her quite bad. One was the second from the top on her left shoulder blade, the other one directly beneath it. When I asked her to clarify bothering she told me the third one down made her want to scratch her skin off. A quick peel back of the tape to see the writing through the chamber tape revealed banana and its partner in crime blackberry. It makes me wonder if my theory about the smoothies was right.

This morning she let me know that another couple of spots were bothering her, including an additional one on the top of her right shoulder blade. We gave up our inspection when she decided the tape removing the fine hairs on her back wasn’t worth it. I guess we will just find out tomorrow.

On a brighter note, I talked to NJH and the Allergist Tylyn will be seeing will be contacting Dr. Nightmare to ensure he is on board with Tylyn coming to Colorado. They also are a little perplexed why a doctor would deny a referral and say he was treating her when there is no course of treatment in place. I guess if someone wants to swing names around, they better be prepared for people to call their bluff.

Until next time, keep scratching as I know Tylyn is waiting to use her Zyrtec again.