We have known about my son Alexander's (9 1/2 yrs old) allergy to peanuts, and tree nuts since he was just under 3 years old.  Alexander began to show severe reaction symptoms very early on and when he was about 5 we realized, just tryng to "stay away" from an allergen was NOT ENOUGH.  He began to have reactions on a fairly regular basis.  When he visited a pediatric allergist, he chose not to do the normal "scratch" skin testing on Alexander for fear that he may have a serious allergic reaction from it.  We chose instead to perform the blood rast test.  Within 5 days we had the "dreaded" call from the doctors office that even the lab Faxed over the results before the remainder of other testing was completed because of the extremely high level of his allergy.  We then knew we had to become much more vigilant to keep him safe and just keeping him away from nuts was not enough.  At 5 we made Alexander responsible for his own Epi-Pen bag which the doctor receommended he carry at least 2 Epi-pens, Benadryl and Oral Steroid.  Our next step was to EDUCATE,. EDUCATE, EDUCATE anyone and everyone possible.  Even if they are not in contact with my son, they may some day be in a situation that could save another child or adult's life with a severe reaction.  It has been a difficult road for Alexander, with many reactions, ER visits and his last "non-ingestion" reaction landed him in the ER, sent home and rushed back within a few hours with a more severe bi-phasic reaction that required him to be on oxygen, heart monitors and hospitalization for 3 days.  This last reaction enforced teh need for education on all parts including the hospital personnel who may not fuly understand the severity of reactions in some people.  We have also in the last year found that he is also severly allergic to Bee venom and the traditional venom therapy that is successful in 97% of the patients was not successful for Alexander.  We decided to take him to a pediatric Allergy Specialist at Cleveland Clinic and he too confirmed Alexander is in the 3% of patients who can not tollerate the venom therapy and it could be life threatening to him if we continued and Alexander is his second highest level patient with peanut allergy.  We had been told in the past that there are not many people in the world with levels as high as him, this confirmed it even stronger.  However, I try not to let this bring more fear, but the need to continue to educate others about the risks and how to prevent or minimize the risk of reactions, but more importantly, if a reaction happens, what to do; including training as many people possible on how to use the epi-pen and how important it is to act calmly and quickly to save someone's life.  As daunting as it can be, we try to not let it take over our lives and allow Alexander to live as normal a life as possible, within limits.  He has accepted the limits and understands it is sometimes a life and death choice and he respects when the answer is NO.  We sometimes recognize some risk in doing something, but allow him to do certain things, such as play summer baseball, and then we just take certain precautions to minimize a reaction.  He is more mature than your normal 9 year old and has many times recognized dangers that I, too have missed.  It has also been recommended that he NEVER fly on an airplane due to the severity of his nut allergy.  Of course, the most difficult part of that is he would LOVE to go to Florida to Disney World, but again, ti would take prior precautions and planning before we make that long DRIVE down to Florida from Michigan.  It is a trip we plan to make in the near future, but again, with a great deal of pre-planning and precautions and many many phone calls to the Hotel and Park.

Our family recognizes that education is the key to protection as you can not eliminate allergens from Alexander's life.  You can limit risk, change what you do and where you go, educate and MOST IMPORTANTLY, ALWAYS carry your Epi-pens.  My son NEVER walks out the door without them.  FAAN has also been a great source of information and education pieces that we can share with others and I have begun to read the anaphalactic updates where a child or adult has lost their life due to a nut allergy reaction and the common problem has always been they did not carry their Epi-pens.  This enforces for him the need to carry it ALL the time.

It's been a tough road for all of us, especially Alexander, but he is a normal little boy, we are a normal family and he lives a fairly normal life and we EDUCATE others EVERY SINGLE DAY in hopes that that can save another person's life in the future.