A Whole New World

Yesterday Ellie performed a most typical toddler task, getting her fingers into our sticker bucket. Here is a picture of what resulted:


For those of you who recognize it, yes it is the sheet of millions of teddy bear heads from Lakeshore. This is quite significant. Why? Because not long ago the corn in the sticker adhesive would have sent Ellie into a full blown FPIES reaction within a matter of minutes or hours. For the first time I did not have to panic. She had no reaction (though I did remove them all immediately).

This is a whole new world for us. This is a sign that her body is healing from the inside out, and confirmation that the formula was keeping her from progressing. And let's not forget the advance in fine motor skills she needed in order to pick each of those little bear heads off of the paper and place them on her leg.

In the last few weeks Ellie has colored with crayons, wrote on her body with markers, played with stickers, and even touched plain old playdough. All with no reaction.

She still has limitations (obviously), and we still must be diligent with what she is exposed to (Bandaids still give her a rash), but this is MOST noteworthy of progress and we are VERY pleased to see her little body begin to take care of itself. All from the inside out.