Last Updated on September 16, 2022 by Natalie

About 6 months ago, before the pandemic and before my little boy turned 1, he had gotten hives on his arm.

He woke up from his nap on my bed… where there were no hard objects around him.

This was just one of several skin issues that had come up so his pediatrician recommended I take him to an allergy doctor.

After the first consultation in February, the doctor told me next step would be to take him to do lab work.

My mind played a short film of the insane reaction baby R has to being in the doctor’s office ever since he had his 2nd round of shots.

The minute the nurse has me put him on the scale, he cries and grabs onto me with terror. When the doctor walks in, he loses it again. And when she measures his head…pfff! What an insult!

My poor boy nearly hyperventilates after his trips to tears-landia and always almost takes me with him.

So I know I dont want to take him to do lab work if it’s not absolutely necessary.

I asked the doctor if there was another option and he said we can skip straight to doing the skin test.

Uh, yes, we will take option B. Which I, personally, think should’ve been option A…but whatever.

As someone who has no experience with allergies, I had no idea what to expect. So if that’s you, too, this one’s for you.

Before the Test

We scheduled the skin test for just before his 1st birthday.

Typically, it’s recommended that you introduce your child to peanut butter before they turn 1 as putting it off longer increases chances of having an allergy to it.

I had always been nervous about introducing it but now I had direction from the allergy doctor to avoid introducing him to anything new until after the test.

That means peanut butter, shellfish, etc.

Then coronavirus became a thing.

His skin test was rescheduled twice putting his actual appointment 4 months after his first birthday.

Since I still breastfeed, this means I was also avoiding these possible threats to my boy.

Okay. Anything for my baby.

Also, I was advised not to give him Zyrtec for a week prior to his test.

The doctor had me giving him Zyrtec for about a week after the first consultation due to the hives that had been popping up but I didn’t give it to him since, anyway.

The Actual Test

The day of the test, Baby R did all the typical doctor’s-office behavior (crying hysterically when a nurse spoke to me).

I was very concerned about how this would go.

The nurse came in and made 4 columns of dots on his back with a marker.

This was very upsetting to Baby R.

Then she brought out a tray with several short little plastic tubes with spikes at the end.

She poked my arm with one to show me how it feels. I don’t know if she was downplaying it because it literally felt like she touched me with a pen cap. Not painful at all.

Well, Baby R told a different story.

She poked above each marked dot on his back with the different plastic tubes.

It left behind a dot of liquid on his skin.

The reason I suspect she was downplaying the prick on me is because, you may notice in the picture that some of the liquid dots have a bit of blood in them.

I was instructed to be careful not to touch the liquid dots.

She left for 15 minutes to allow for any reactions.

Once the 15 minutes were up, she was back and measured the spots, jotted down some numbers and then cleaned off his back and put some cream to soothe the itching.

Then she ruined my plans to eat a shellfish feast that evening let me know I needed to schedule an appointment to get the results from the doctor…next week.

The Results

He is NOT allergic to peanuts! Yay!

NOT allergic to shellfish! 🥳🦐🍤

NOT allergic to dairy. Great!

He IS allergic to tree nuts. 😐 Especially hazelnut 😲😕

He IS allergic to egg whites. Wait, what?? I just gave him eggs that morning 😳

Also, he’s allergic to cats and dust mites.

The good news is that the doctor expects him to grow out of these allergies. As a person with no allergies, I was pleasantly surprised to hear that growing out of an allergy is a thing.

More importantly, the reactions to these allergies aren’t expected to be severe or life threatening.

The bad news is that I have some additional diet limitations on my very picky 16 month old. But we’re working around it.

Next Steps

We will get him re-tested when he turns 2 to see if he’s outgrown the allergies. 🤞

I hope this gives someone some relief if they don’t know what to expect for their little ones.