Holding Our Breath

Two-fisted drinker! One sippy of Ali RTF and one of safe water. Too cute!

If you follow me on Facebook you know that Tuesday night, a mere 5 days after the Splash reaction, we were pretty much forced into a new formula trial. This time, we chose Alimentum RTF. 

We had tentative hope for the Ali, because it is the only formula that has NO corn as part of the ingredients list. It does, however, have dairy, and last summer Zac reacted to Nutramigen – another dairy based hydrolized formula.

So our prayers and hopes were based on one simple sentence: “Please, oh please, let him have outgrown his sensitivity to dairy!”

Last summer he also showed IgE to dairy (scary IgE – epi-pen worthy gigantic welts from the SPT), but at his appointment in  January he showed no IgE reaction to dairy through either SPT or RAST.

We simply crossed our fingers that last summers Nutramigen reaction was IgE and NOT FPIES.

To be on the safe side, we got the Epi-pens out and had them close by the first time we gave him the Ali, anyway.

Tuesday night he had 2 ounces of Ali at dinner. He sucked it down and cried for more! The next day, he had 4 sippy cups of 4 ounces each throughout the day and was just fine.

Fine enough, in fact, that I had to start getting my bags packed for work.

The whole point of this was to find something safe for him to eat while I’m at work, after all, so I packed and watched him with an eagle eye.

He seemed…fine!

Zac enjoys drinking his Ali, and though he did have a few poopy diapers on Wednesday, they were pretty standard “formula poos” and tested negative for blood. 

So, still nervous, yesterday morning we loaded the car with luggage, got Zac in his car seat, and hit the road for the airport. I nursed him along the way, said goodbye at the drop-off zone, and headed in to begin my trek to San Francisco for my first trip in my new base.

I knew that at any point during the day I might get a phone call saying I needed to turn around and head back home because Zac had a reaction.

‘Edgy’ just about covered my mood on Thursday!

By the end of the day, I wound up in San Fran to get the report that Zac was just fine, he had another poopy diaper that was standard formula poo (Army green, sort of thick, really stinky), and had drunk 42 ounces of Ali on TOP of the nursing he’d done before I left. Whew!

It’s still far too soon to call Ali a “safe food”; but at this point it looks like it will either be a safe food eventually, or a slow, chronic build reaction that just might get us through the rest of August for me to work.

There’s a lot riding on this; if Ali proves safe for him, I will be able to easily return to work in February, we can immediately move on to additional food trials, AND Darrel and I can finally, FINALLY get to have a “date night”!  (That last one is just the desperate fantasizing of two parents who haven’t had a moments break in over a year.)

If you wouldn’t mind, keep praying that he can tolerate this formula!

I start work today, and I’m still anxiously waiting for “Zac news”. After hearing how well he did on almost all formula on Thursday, though, I’m starting to relax…a little bit. It helps that Tuesday I also discovered one of his molars finally popped through. Fewer teething symptoms means easier diagnosis for him, and – hopefully – fewer strange things for him to chew up!

We sit here…holding our breath and waiting…

In the meantime, I have to share with you the most gorgeous necklace in the entire world.

The most beautiful necklace in the world.

Yup, cheap plastic beads on pipe cleaners. There can’t possibly be anything more precious than a necklace made by a 3 year old for Mommy! I love my boys!

Come back Monday for a quick Zac update AND a promised post: how to clean your oil! THANK YOU FOR YOUR PRAYERS!!!