Defining Acceptable Risk For Our Children
Being a parent is tough for a lot of reasons. One of them is the worry most of us have about something bad happening to our children. We live in an age of school shootings and other tragedies. For those of us whose kids have life-threatening health conditions or other special needs, that risk can weigh heavily on our minds.
I realized today that we all have to define our own levels of acceptable risk. My son has anaphylactic allergies to dairy, cashew, pistachio, and pink peppercorn. Some of his reactions occur simply from contact with those items, and we think his nut allergies might include airborne reactions – but for obvious reasons, we are unwilling to test that again. He also has Type 1 diabetes.
We are now in our third year of public school. Fortunately, my son has a 1:1 aide who is there to oversee diabetes, and also be on the lookout for allergens in his environment. For the past two years, we had the same nurse caring for him. Today is Day 4 with the new aide. And it’s my first day of dropping him off and leaving.
About two hours after drop off she gave him insulin for his snack. One of the (many) safety protocols we have in place is that she lets me know how much she dosed. For simplicity’s sake right now, she is sending me a photo of the pump. I looked at the photo and immediately knew something was wrong. He had gotten about 5 times as much insulin as he should have for that snack. I called her and she wasn’t sure what had happened, so I raced to school. As I was driving, I was calculating how many carbs we would have to feed him to offset the insulin and avoid hypoglycemia.
As it turns out, she had sent me a photo from Friday’s lunch dose. Phew! That was a bit of an adrenaline rush. I reassured her everything was okay, told her that mistakes happen...and that I make them too, and that we will all learn from them. Then we came up with a different protocol for communicating about doses. Open communication and learning from our mistakes is key to a good working relationship and ensuring my son’s safety.
A few hours later I started wondering about the maximum dose his pump is currently set to allow, and realized I need to check that – and probably lower it while she is learning. And it made me wonder what medical procedures, aside from a Glucagon “rescue” shot they use to try to recover from an overdose. (I’ll be asking our endocrinologist at our next visit – I enjoy learning, and I like to be prepared!)
I can’t keep my child in a bubble. I used to want to. Now, I’ve become comfortable taking well-calculated risks. We don’t go to birthday parties at Chuck E. Cheese where there is sure to be dairy on every surface; I don’t let anyone bring food into my home; and finding a babysitter I trust is difficult. But despite allergens, we go to parks, playdates, birthday parties, and diabetes camp. Now don’t get me wrong – I am always observing what is happening around us. A few years ago he was playing with some kids at a lake. The kids wanted to collect shells, and I watched the mom dump out a bag of pistachio shells and hand the bag to her son. I was there in a split second explaining his allergies, and offering a different bag. We’ve left parties where there are bowls of mixed nuts everywhere. And I only have a few friends I allow to feed him or give him insulin.
But school. School is different. I’m handing him, and frankly, his life, over to people – some of whom I barely know. What gives me comfort is my plan. The minutia I’ve considered. The painstaking attention to details. The contingencies for contingencies. My ability to communicate. The stellar team the school district has put into place. And the peace of mind that comes from knowing I’m doing all I can to keep him safe and healthy.