So we knew about the milk allergy because of the spilt milk episodes, but G. was a bit young yet to have allergy tests. We were very careful about introducing new foods and we had begun the eye squinting job of label reading in the grocery store. G. was not quite at the ‘feeding himself’ stage, but he sat in his high chair at the dinner table with us. It was Sunday night and I had my parents over for dinner. For this meal dessert is expected and I had made small meringues, the melt in your mouth variety. I gave one to G. to play with while we finished our own. I figured it would be safe because if he did put it in his mouth, it would just melt away. Choking was the only thing I had to worry about with a baby learning to feed himself, right? There was no dairy in my home-made meringues so no problem. G. played with the meringue, rolling it around in his hands. My heart did that shudder skip beat thing when I saw the red welts form on his fingers and G. start to itch. Luckily it hadn’t yet made it to his mouth. Egg!? Allergic to egg? Yup. A thorough wash and a check mark in the box for egg allergy. Heavy sigh.
