First time to use epi pen

Meeshe

The good news is it truly is easy to use.  The bad news is, we don't know what caused it.  DS has a peanut allergy but nothing had peanuts in it.  Everything we had to eat, he's had before.  My best guess is he's developed an allergy to a berry (since we had a berry smoothie for dessert) or fish (which we had as part of dinner).  Need to wait 4-6 weeks for meds to clear before allergy retesting.  So frustrating to not know what to avoid!

EmR22

That sucks having to wait! I'm glad to hear that it's easy but sad that you had to find out. My DD has had hers for 4 years and I have yet to have to use it and for that I am grateful. 

sapphiremom13

I am glad everything turned out okay.  How scary!  

lrn327

Oh no!  What were the symptoms that caused you to use the Epi?  I'm so sorry, that must have been scary.

magdusia

sorry to hear that. did you make the smoothie or from a store? i know a lots of stores make it with almond milk.  Hope you find out what it is soon!  i hate the waiting game

LSU628

Crash Into Me said:

Yikes! I'd love for you to walk us through what happened (symptoms) if you're up to it.

Agreed. What did you see/hear/experience that let you know it was time to use the epi? I always worry that I'll panic and second guess myself.

Meeshe

Oh sorry ladies, it's been a crazy week (we had a large tree fall down in the yard last night-luckily no one hurt).  We made the smoothie at home so I know it had no nuts in it.  It was just mixed berries, greek yogurt, milk, honey, and a pinch of salt.

We were just finishing dinner and my husband went in to wipe DS off because he had smoothie ALL over his face and I was in the kitchen and he started screaming for me to bring the epi pen (I didn't even understand him at first).  Finally I realized what he was saying and ran in there and looked at him and he had very visible hives all over around his mouth.  I told DH that hives didn't necessarily mean epi pen, it meant benadryl so I ran up to get that.  We gave that to him and then right then noticed his lips were swelling and it was at that point that I knew we needed to use the epi pen.  So I ran and got that, pulled the top off, warned my DS (who is 2.5) that it might hurt and jabbed it in his thigh and counted to 10.  DS was great, he didn't even cry.  Then I said, ok now we need to take him to the hospital (we are fortunate and live less than 5 min. from a top Children's Hospital, I know you are really supposed to call the ambulance, but this was faster).  We also then noticed some swelling on his hands and possibly a little on his feet.

By the time we were triaging at the hospital the reaction was already starting to subside a bit so the epi pen worked quickly.  They said his breathing was fine every time they checked.  They gave him a steroid and observed for several hours and then had us follow-up with a steroid at home for 3-4 days.

So, that's my story.  Let me know if you have any questions.  It was scary because we don't know what caused it but I knew exactly what to do and the epi pen has clear instructions on it.  I only hesitated a tiny bit about the hospital but knew I had read to immediately call 911 (or in our case go in) if we used it.

Meeshe

FYI-we saw the allergist today and she said swollen lips is borderline for epi pen, because it COULD resolve with just the benadryl.  But because my DS is only 2.5 and can't reliably tell us whether his throat is closing, etc., you err on the side of using it.

LSU628

Good to know, thanks for sharing!