Are your allergic children otherwise healthy?

[strawberrycornetto]

Poor DS has another chest infection and another dose of antibiotics. He's 10 months old and he's now had two lots of bronchiolitis, 2 lots of pneumonia (1 of which serious with a collapsed lung) and now another chest infection, all since November.

I am so worried about him. Is this part of having food allergies? I am not giving him a good enough diet? We have good medical support but I feel very alone with it. I'm so worried there is something else wrong but could it just be he's vulnerable because of the allergies? I don't know what to do.

Sorry, this is going round in circles and I probably should have posted it under children's health, but I feel more at home here.

[Friendlypizzaeater]

NO - DS (6 yrs) allergic to eggs/seafood, intolerant to tomatoes and onions. Eats at least 6 portions of fruit & veg everyday - normally more and catches every bug going - continually suffering with colds, ear infections, chesty coughs etc

[trixymalixy]

Sorry to hear your DS has been so poorly so often.

I'm really not sure about allergies making kids more susceptible to illness.

My DS has multiple allergies, but I don't think he has been ill more often than any of my friend's kids.

[strawberrycornetto]

Thanks. Probably just one of those things. I guess I just don't want there to be a more sinister explanation.

[foxinsocks]

one of mine was like this.

Ds was just awful. Chest infection after chest infection (he had one just after he was born and then they just carried on happening!). I was convinced he would be on inhalers for the rest of his life.

But you know what, age 3, he seemed to get much stronger and he stopped taking inhalers because he'd been months without an infection or even wheezing.

And you know what? Age 7 now and he's only needed antibiotics twice since then, once when he had scarlet fever and once when he had a double ear and throat infection.

Can I ask one thing though?

Is he vomiting a lot with his allergies? Sometimes if they are vomiting a lot and inhale stuff back into their lungs, it can cause problems with infections. I'm sure your doctors would have thought of this though.

I must give you my sympathies. It is EXHAUSTING when they are ill like this all the time. Fingers crossed that he gets through this winter and comes out of it stronger.

[ladyjuliafish]

ds is 4 and is allergic to peanuts. He also has a viral induced wheeze which he seems to be outgrowing.

I don't think that he gets ill more than others but he seems to react more. ie if dd has a snotty nose for 3 days, ds will have a temp of 42 for a week. He took ages to recover from chickenpox, dd caught it after him and recovered much sooner. The last few months he has seemed much stronger and is reacting more 'normally'.

[Mumfie68]

DS is 7, has been asthmatic since 3 months (they initially thought it was bronchiolitis) and anaphylactic to milk since 4 months. He's also allergic to eggs and is currently avoiding nuts, due to a high-ish RAST reading combined with his other allergies. He tends to get worse colds than other kids, mostly because that's his main asthma trigger, and like your ds ladyjuliafish he had a really bad time with chickenpox. That might have been because he was popping his spots and ended up getting them all infected though, he's like that! Most things he gets are usually self-inflicted...

Overall though I'd call him healthy. He plays rugby and goes swimming every week, and he's one of those kids who just never stops moving around, he's always into everything. We try really hard to not limit what he does due to allergies/asthma; in fact I'm sure all the sport he does is really good for him as it seems to keep his chest clear. Certainly he did seem worse when he was young and less mobile, as soon as he was running around he seemed to get a lot better. Certainly all his hospital admissions for asthma were when he was little, we haven't been in for at least 3 years.

Is there a possibility that the chest infections are asthma related? I know that they're starting to realise that asthma is not so much one single condition as a whole variety of lung conditions that are sometimes hard to diagnose/no obvious classic symptoms, and I'm pretty sure allergic kids are more prone to asthma.

[heliotrope]

My experience with ds is that he was generally unwell from about 4-7 months, gaining hardly any weight during that time at all. The onset of eczema brought him down - - he was itchy and it distracted him from his feeds - and once it was infected he had to have antibiotics and after these he had a series of D&V bugs, I'm convinced they were due to the anti biotics stripping out his gut. Looking back at the pictures he looked terrible for months on end.
Fortunately as he outgrew the eczema he has gained strength, despite a few allergies, and now I would say he is average in terms of number of colds etc.

So for us the ill health was linked with the baby eczema rather than the allergies, but all part of the same atopic tendencies I guess.

Hope it gets better for you soon - it is horrible when your baby is poorly.

[tatt]

they were seriously ill when small. Since they stopped having ear infections (about 5) they have had very few infections and nothing more serious.

And my OH drove his parents crazy as a baby catching anything that was going - but then had hardly anything when he got past 5.

So comfort yourself with the thought that it seems to get better, if only you can survive that long.

[feelingfestive]

I do sympathise, it is exhausting having a run of illness like that.

FWIW I think that my allergic child (who also has asthma) does seem to get ill more often - or maybe it is that her immune system 'overreacts' to viruses and her symptoms are worse. I read somewhere that cold symptoms can be viewed as an over zealous immune response (we don't actually need to churn out loads of snot to get rid of the virus). Seems logical that those who already have an over reactive immune system will have worse symptoms - dd (5) seems to suffer mainly from being snottier than average with colds and so then having lungs full of phlegm, hacking cough, asthma etc (sorry TMI!).

I have just gone through a phase of worrying that she has some real immune problem (leukaemia or the like). I think (hope) I am being paranoid, it is starting school, being allergic and being a bit unlucky I think.

BTW she also ate loads of fruit and recently seems to have thrived better on more stodge! I have been making cakes and biscuits like a mad woman, she is looking less skinny and seem healthier. Having said that she seems to be getting yet another cold

Sorry for waffling, the bottom line is things should improve as they all grow up and in the meantime give yourself a pat on the back for coping with such a rubbish phase.

PS - sorry about the unseasonal name - coudn't be bothered to change it!

[strawberrycornetto]

Thanks everyone, haven't had a chance to come back and read until now and don't have much time. FF, is the immube problem paranoia that's been worrying me too to be honest, like you I hope I'm wrong. I think that's why I wondered about the allergy thing.

[wb]

Ds1 is otherwise very healthy. He has food allergies but no asthma/eczema. I was very allergic as a child (less so now) and literally had bronchitis once a month til I was (finally) diagnosed as asthmatic. Once I had an inhaler to treat the asthma the bronchitis became a very rare thing.

To this day if I have an asthma attack and don't use my inhaler I get a nasty chest infection. Other than that I am very healthy.

Hope things improve for your ds. My nephew is not allergic at all and had constant ear infections as a baby/small child. So the 2 are not necessarily related.

[strawberrycornetto]

Thanks WB. I suspect asthma may be at the root of DS's problems with his chest, or viral wheeze which someone else here mentioned. Either way, he's still pretty sick this weekend despite being on antibiotics. He has a consultant appointment at the end of Jan so I really hope they get to the bottom of it and perhaps prescribe him an inhaler that will help keep him healthy. It seems so unfair, he's so bright and full of life and I feel like these issues are blighting his first year. .