Forced to face a moment no mom wants to face

My sweet, funny brother in law got married in Kansas a few weeks ago. He has been more like a brother to me for the past several years. So it was really special to watch and be apart of his special day.  

The weeks leading up to the wedding we were really conflicted on whether we should bring the boys, bring a sitter or have someone stay at our house with them. I didn't want to leave someone at our house since we had just moved in and it was a mess and we didn't yet have all the safety precautions in place for the pool. In the end we brought a sitter which made it really nice to be able to enjoy the wedding and rehearsal dinner.

We made it through the wedding and taking pictures. And headed over to the reception. We were a little late getting to the reception and had to sit up front near the head table. I wasn't super excited about that because I knew the boys were tired and cranky and I didn't want them to disrupt the reception. I noticed we were sitting right next to an exit door. That gave me comfort in knowing we could make a quick undisturbed exit if we needed to.

Hubby got the boys their food while I manned the table. I glanced around and noticed sitting behind us was my husband's uncle, aunt, dad, and cousins. Little man quickly noticed the cake on the front table and the sucker sitting in front of him. Picking my battles, I decided to go ahead and let little man eat the sucker while we were waiting on food.

Hubby made it over with the food and told little man he needed to finish lunch before he could finish the sucker. Little man put up a little bit of a fight. He didn't want to eat the cucumber sandwich. Him putting up a fight is nothing new when it comes to food. He eventually ate it and we gave him his sucker back. During this time the couple had just finished cutting the cake and the best man was stepping up to speak. While the best man was giving his speech I noticed little man's eye was red and slightly puffy but he had just been rubbing it and was really tired. So I shrugged it off and continued to listen. Right as the the best man finished his speech I looked back down at little man. The whole left side of his face was swelling. My stomach sank and my mind started racing. We didn't have an epi-pen or benadryl and we were in the middle of NO WHERE! Without hesitation I turned around and told hubby's aunt who is a nurse that little man was having an allergic reaction. Hubby, his aunt Paula, and myself unbuckled little man so fast and whisked out the door heads were spinning. Most people later said they didn't even know we had left. We got outside and his swelling was getting worse. He was starting to cough and his lips were starting to swell. Little man has never reacted to anything like this. We loaded in the car and realized the closest hospital was 25 miles away. Hubby was racing to the hospital with his flashers on. I sat in the back with little man to make sure he was still able to breathe.

On the way we came across a walgreens. By this time he was getting welts all over his face. Paula and hubby ran in to get some benadryl. Hubby ripped it out of the package, gave it to Paula to bring out, yelled to the pharmacist to give him a syringe and he stayed inside to pay for it. She came running out and quickly opened the package. We gave him a double dose of benadryl and on the way to the ER we went.

In those moments there is so much adrenaline pumping you can't feel anything. I just kept praying silently that everything would be ok. I asked little man at one point to let me see inside his mouth. His throat wasn't swollen shut but was definitely swelling.

We made it to the ER quickly with hubby's driving and we rushed inside. We were quite the sight, with hubby in a tux and myself and Paula really dressed up. Inside there was quite the crowd but the clerk took us back immediately after seeing the urgency. Little man was treated and we were released. He was ok, thank goodness!!

We later learned that little man has a cucumber allergy. So strange! There is nothing quite like facing one of your worst fears when it comes to your child. God's hand was in everything that afternoon keeping little man safe. We are thankful for that but we hope it's something we never have to face again!

Have you ever had a scary moment like this one?