Dose Delayed No Whole Peanut Yet

If you are new to this blog, todays post details a problem my son Alexander encountered last week with his peanut oral immunotherapy treatment. 
See my prior post "Delay in Eating Whole Peanut Probable"


True to my suspicions Alexander was not allowed to increase his peanut dose to 1 whole peanut. 
Here's why.
Last week Alexander skipped his night time dose due to nausea. The next morning he reluctantly followed the doctors instructions and took half of his 500 mg dose. Unfortunately Alexander vomited up the dose. I called Dr. Wasserman and his instructions for my son were as follows:
1- drink some clear liquids.
2- After 1 hour try to eat some crackers.
3- after another few hours try ingesting a half dose of the 500mg capsule.
4- if successful then take a full dose that night


If you are wondering how one ingests half of a dose, read on.
For his half dose Alexander emptied the entire 500 mg capsule of peanut flour into a glass of blueberry IZZE Sparkling Juice and stirred it thoroughly. Next as directed by the doctor he poured out half of his peanut "cocktail" into the sink then proceeded to drink the remaining amount.
This worked perfectly. No problems. That night Xander took a full dose dose of 500 mg of peanut flour in capsule form. 
He was back on schedule at least for the moment.


Dr.Wasserman decided not to increase Alexander's peanut dose for another week. 


Voila no eating his first whole peanut for my boy- not yet.
My opinion is really of no consequence; however, I agreed (silently of course) with the doctors decision. 
My "mothers instinct" had spoken to me saying "BAD IDEA". 
It made no common sense to me to hurry the treatment just to stay "on schedule". Caution should be the byword. I believed that a sick child with his immune system now lowered should not have it stressed further by increasing the dose of a food to which he is highly allergic. 


I had not conducted any online research on this topic when the next morning my friend Stacey Hanley sent me an email with some related information. Her son Nate has already successfully completed the desensitization phase of the same treatment Alexander is receiving. Nate is now able to eat Snickers candy bars. Yikes!  I will write her interesting comments in my next post.


For now the "Countdown to 1 Whole Peanut" has begun again.
Thursday January 27th Alexander hopes to be allowed to increase his dose to 1 Whole Peanut!

Delay in Eating Whole Peanut Probable

Probable delay in eating 1 Whole Peanut. Alexander is due this Thursday, January 20 to have his peanut dose increased from 500 mg of peanut flour in capsule form to 1 Whole Peanut. We have been counting down the days to this momentous occasion.

See my prior posts 
"3 Days Until 1 Peanut" and 
"Countdown to 1 Whole Peanut"
This past weekend Alexander started having a runny nose and sore throat. 

My thoughts rambled..."could this be a slight reaction due to the 500 mg peanut dose?" 
or "is this due to seasonal allergies caused by a change in the weather?  
Nasal and asthma symptoms in Alexander are often triggered by weather changes. 
"Perhaps attending an extremely cold soccer game last Friday night wearing only a thin hooded sweatshirt might have started the whole thing". 

Very cold night to watch a soccer game in a hoodie

He seemed to get a little better until last night when after playing in a soccer game he said "I feel sick to my stomach. I think I ate too much at lunch." He proceeded to eat very little dinner. 
When the time came to take his peanut dose he said "I can't do it". The thought of it makes me want to throw up anyway and my stomach is already gurgling."  

Hmmm- what to do?  
Tell him he must take the dose? 
The dosing instructions we received from Dallas Allergy Immunology for the peanut desensitizing treatment are very precise. The patient is to avoid any deviations from the dosing schedule. If a dose is missed for any reason a call is to be placed to the doctor.


Alexander pleaded with me not to take his peanut dose so I called the doctor's answering service. 
Dr. Wasserman returned my call and he agreed that Xander should not take the dose. 

His instructions:
Skip the dose. Take a half dose in the morning followed by a full dose in the evening. 
We followed those instructions. 
My son was very happy he did not have to take the peanut dose.

Dateline this morning- Xander still feels sick to his stomach. We requested he take the dose anyway. Of course he threw it up immediately. 
Alexander really dislikes the taste of peanuts and almost gags any time he takes a dose. 
He always managed to ingest the dose successfully in the past; however,this time an already queasy teenager plus the dreaded peanut taste was the perfect combination for a return trip of the peanut dose. 

Stay tuned to find out what happens next....