The next morning (New Year's day), we went to the mall to have breakfast at Panera Bread (yay - I finally found bear claws!). Since the stores were still closed, but the mall was open for mall walkers, we let Kirby play in the kid's area for a bit, then meander down the mall to practice walking. He walked about the length of 4 stores on his own! He only ran into 1 person - she didn't know which way to go to avoid him and he grabbed onto her legs. Thankfully she was nice about the whole thing. :)
Since then, Kirby still wants to hold my finger to walk, but he's basically running around the house by himself. It's so funny to watch him because he holds both arms in the air like he's a doctor that just washed his hands before surgery. :)
Now we just have to work on him standing up by himself. He's done it a few times, but now he refuses to stand straight up - he seems to need something to climb so he can get to his feet. I'm sure once he walks a bit more that he'll be motivated to get up after falling down.
Also on New Year's day..... the low point.
Kirby will be going back to day care February 1 and for some reason I got it in my head that we should give him peanut butter since he may come in contact with peanuts at school. At Kirby's 12 month appt, the dr gave us the go ahead to give him anything we want, but I haven't been in a rush to try peanuts until now.
I had 5 little pieces of wheat toast, and I put peanut butter on each of the pieces. We put it on Kirby's plate, but of course he didn't pick it up. He still doesn't like to touch new things - especially if they're squishy. So we ended up feeding him 3 pieces. He didn't seem to like or dislike the flavor - just seemed pretty neutral (which is weird b/c peanut butter is delicious!). After around 5 minutes, he started to rub his eyes. I thought it was just because he was tired since he just woke up from a nap. The he started to tug at his ear and raised his hands like he wanted us to pick him up. I didn't immediately think that he was having an allergic reaction since everything seemed so subtle. I got a phone call from my dad so I didn't see the rest of his symptoms, but by the time I got off the phone (less than 10 minutes), Gary & my MIL thought he wasn't acting right - in addition to rubbing his eyes and tugging his ear, Kirby started drooling a lot.
I decided to call the ask a nurse but since it was a holiday, I knew it'd be 30+ minutes before they called me back. We decided that we'd better be safe and took Kirby to Urgent Care. I sat in the back seat with Kirby to make sure he was ok and his breathing changed a little (it sounded raspy). I was worried that since it was New Year's day that the wait would be long (the sign actually said over an hour), but as soon as I said what was wrong, a nurse was called and we were taken back. The nurse got all his vitals, and then by the time the dr came to see us, Kirby was back to normal (breathing normally, no more drooling, eye rubbing, etc). The dr looked him over and said that everything seemed ok. Kirby was given Benedryl, which was funny b/c Kirby was sucking that stuff down like it was candy. The nurse said she'd never seen a baby enjoy it so much. :)
We had to wait 20 minutes while the Benedryl took effect and it was SO difficult keeping him out of all the drawers. We tried holding him, but of course he just learned to walk so he wanted to roam free and touch *everything*! The dr came back, said Kirby looked normal, gave us a prescription for an EpiPen and prednisone, and we left. The rest of the day was uneventful, except that I didn't hear a peep from Kirby all night long. I'm guessing he was still a little drugged from the Benedryl.
Sunday - nothing happened, but then Kirby seemed to have another weird reaction on Monday while eating lunch. He started rubbing his eyes, tugging his ears, etc. He hadn't eaten anything with peanuts, but there was a quiche that was made in the same processing plant with peanuts. I called his pediatrician in hopes of getting an appt for him to get checked for allergies and luckily they had an appt available that afternoon. Kirby seemed fine after about 15 minutes, but his eyes were still red and puffy by the time we went to the dr office. We had to wait quite a while, but it gave Kirby plenty of opportunities to practice walking *all over* the waiting room. :)
When the dr came to examine Kirby, she said almost immediately that his reaction isn't allergies, but pink eye. I didn't see this, but she said that there's yellowish discharge and the rim of the eyes look exactly like pink eye. Additionally, she said that she's suspicious that what happened 2 days before was an allergic reaction - mainly b/c Kirby got better completely on his own (without meds). She obviously couldn't say for sure since she didn't examine him that day, but she felt certain that his reaction earlier in the day was just b/c he has pink eye. At least that was a little bit of a relief! Putting eye drops in Kirby's eyes certainly wasn't fun, but thankfully that only lasted 3 days. On top of pink eye, Kirby's also has a little cold, so he's also snotty and hasn't had much of an appetite. Poor little dude!
We made an appt with an allergist to get him tested so that we know for sure what we're dealing with. Unfortuantely, the next available appt isn't until the beginning of March. :( We've gone this long without exposing Kirby to peanuts, so it's just for 2 more months. We'll let day care know there's a possibility and until then, I'm trying not to think about it much b/c it makes me sad thinking that my beautiful little guy might have a life threatening allergy.
Happy New Year!
