Food Allergy Test

Food Allergy Test Markings (and black bean hands)

Adeline has been dealing with chronic constipation for eight months now. At first her doctor prescribed her glycerin suppositories and Miralax once a day. The suppositories were needed too often so they upped her Miralax dosage. For the last couple months she's been on an adult dose of Miralax each day in order for her to poop. 

One symptom of food allergies is constipation so yesterday we visited an allergist to see if that could be the cause of her constipation. First, the doctor wanted to discuss her skin since she has eczema and noted that it was dry. He wants her to take two baths a day (for 30 minutes, if possible) and then apply Eucerin lotion. He explained, to my surprise, that soaking in water hydrates your skin, which is what causes your skin to prune after being in the water for awhile. Makes sense, but I'd always heard baths dried out skin. 

After that he ordered a skin prick test for food allergies which was done right in the room. My poor baby was already inconsolable because the doctor took away the Ernie doll he loaned her during his examination and now she had to get pricked about 20 times. First, the tech wrote down abbreviations for all the foods on her arm. She was interested in this part, as well as the next: droplets of the food next to each pen marking. After that came the not so fun part =(. He pricked her arm on every droplet, cleaning off the needle in between each one. Once that was finished we had to wait about five minutes to see what she reacted to. The doctor marked reactions to histamine, egg whites, whole egg, and peanuts. On those parts of her arm it became red and a little bump formed. However, the reaction weren't bad enough to warrant removing those items from her diet. He suggested we go back to the G.I. and address the chronic constipation there. So, on to the next specialist...

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