And that is why our Christmas tree is on our front porch

Poor Evan. We just can't figure this boy out. During the winter he gets so congested and sounds horrible but he isn't sick. I remember taking him to preschool and telling his teacher that he wasn't sick, he just sounded horrible. He runs around just fine and doesn't have a runny nose at all. It is just when he coughs he sounds like he has pneumonia or something. It's really weird and frustrating. 

Well, this spring and summer he got like that. I kept taking him to the doctor trying to figure out what the deal was. The dr. thought it was allergies and put him on over the counter allergy meds. Those didn't work so we switched meds and added a nasal spray to try to help. It did seem like it helped but not totally. 

So then the "investigator" part of the mom brain kicked in and out of the blue I started thinking that maybe he was allergic to dogs. He had been sleeping downstairs in the guest room since Trevor was born and Cody's crate is in there. Maybe sleeping right next to the crate was causing a problem. So we moved him up to Trevor's room and within a week he cleared up. Hmmmm - interesting. Could be the dog, could be the medicine finally kicked in. We weren't totally sure what happened.

Then a few weeks ago we went to some friends house for an open house cookie exchange and within about 30-45 minutes he started sneezing and sneezing and sneezing. He was a mess so we left quickly and brought him home and put him in the shower. Turns out they have dogs. Very interesting. So now we think he is allergic to dogs. We don't have any medical tests to confirm, just going on observation.

Well he seemed to be doing just fine and then he got all congested again. What changed? The only thing we could figure out was that we brought the Christmas tree in. It has been in our house for about 2 weeks and he has been a mess the whole time. Now we also got a small cold in our house so it was hard to tell if it was all cold or still some allergy mess he had but everyone else got over the cold quickly so we think he is still having an allergy to the tree. And remember when I was pregnant with Trevor and we went camping and spent the night in the ER because Evan was having trouble breathing? We were camping in pines. Interesting. So, to be safe and to see what happens, we moved our tree to the front porch: 

 And now, I'm sure, all our neighbors think we are crazy. But he does seem to be getting better. It has only been 2 days so it could take some time to get all the "tree smell" out of the house but his coughs are drier and his nose doesn't seem so congested.

I don't know. Being a parent is hard. Trying to figure out what is going on and what is causing the issues and what to do to fix them is exhausting. And I know this is nothing compared to what some parents have to deal with. I feel for them! I think I am going to have him tested for allergies. Trevor has a check up this week so I am going to take Evan with me and see if I can't get a lab slip to have him tested. It would just be nice to know what triggers him so that we can avoid it or prepare for it.

And so that is why our Christmas tree is on our front porch.