This is the first and only time I've used my Epi-pen thankfully. This is my story, and I hope it can teach some of you to stay safe!
It was Thanksgiving of 2017, and me and my family had decided to switch over from our traditional at home turkey dinner and go out to a friends house. It was only five minutes away, but my mom had came prepared with a meal and dessert she had made herself for me to eat, and of course my Allergy Kit. Throughout the night, I was fine until it was desert time. Another mom there also had a son with Walnut allergies, and swore that their was not a single nut or legume in a tray of cookies she had baked. She told us the ingredients, brands, etc. and me and my mom had made the unison decision to trust her. Mistake #1. That night, I had three cookies, you can say my sweet tooth go the best of me. Mistake #2, the average person would not eat that many cookies. It was about 15 minutes later my stomach began to hurt and feel incredibly bloated. I put it off, for a little bit assuming that I had just eaten too much. I continued to play games with the other kids, until the pain was just simply too unbearable.
I went to my mom and could feel my fluids coming up, "I'm going to throw up." I rushed to the bathroom and began to nonstop puke in the sink. We immediately went home, where I continued to puke and thought that I had possibly gotten food poisoning. My Mom had decided to take out the Allergy Action Plan. I didn't have the swelling in the throat, hives, or difficulty breathing that I had always been informed about when it comes to an Anaphylactic reaction. On the Allergy Action Plan I was able to see that responses to an Anaphylactic Reaction could include multiple digestive issues, but I was still unaware if I was having a reaction. Confused I called my allergist in NYC. The Doctor on call that day told me to take Benadryl. That didn't make sense as I was just going to throw it up. I decided against it and seconds before I took the Epi-pen, we received a call back to take the Epi-pen from the allergist. I took the Epi-pen and went to CentraState Hospital. There the Doctors confirmed that I had an Anaphylactic Reaction from something I had eaten that night, and that taking the Epi-pen was the right course of action.Thankfully everything was okay.
This is definitely a learning lesson, that you can really not trust anyone. Even allergy parents can never understand the severity of your allergy and what's safe for you. Grasping the topic of allergies is something that many people have trouble with, and at the end of the day it is only you that you could put 100% trust in and what you feel comfortable with.