Dealing With Repeated Bouts Of Pneumonia
The problem with some allergies and sensitivities is that they take some time to manifest. This turned out to be the case with Taylor and her neurological allergy to corn. At about 1 year of age after surviving with a cold the entire winter I had to take her to the hospital again. I was concerned with the constant rattling and wheezing in her chest. At the hospital they informed me that Taylor had asthma and would require puffers. Safe enough I assumed, lots of kids have asthma don’t they?
It took 2 years for more symptoms to manifest. In addition to the asthma she was getting pneumonia regularly. Watching your child suffer with IVs and severe sickness is hard on the heart. I huddled into protection mode and decided to figure this out. When I asked some doctors the answer was simply that some kids just got pneumonia and that they would grow out of it. That answer was not good enough for me. I began to question the lack of answers that I was receiving. I was okay with it when it was about me, but being a mother changed me. It simply wasn’t good enough. I was here to protect her and the “we don’t know why” struck a chord with me.
Giving a child a puffer and antibiotics only treats the symptoms, it doesn’t get at the cause. We were fearful of the flu season because it always came with much sickness for Taylor. We wondered what would happen when we sent her to school and she had to contend with all of the germs. We were very strict about where she went, and did not let her play with anyone who had any virus. Looking back, it was very stressful to always fear the next bout of pneumonia or ear infection. At one point her ears were so bad that both of her eardrums blew and literally bled. If ever I could have taken away something from her and given it to myself that was the time. I attributed her weakened immune system to the fact that she was born premature and tried to quietly resign myself to the fact that she was always going to be sick. That lasted for about another six months until I began my quest to find out why she was always sick, and with that quest grew my determination to say goodbye to pneumonia for good.