A Mother’s Resolve

When even a little bit of powdered milk in a bowl of ice cream can cause an extreme reaction, navigating your child’s food allergies becomes challenging—and highly fraught. In this episode, Holly Esteves describes the challenges of keeping her son safe in the face of his allergies. She describes how faith, diligence, and lots of medical advice helps her keep her son safe.

Holly Esteves: [00:00:00] Can you sing wise men say?

Jackson Esteves: Wise men say, only fools rush in, but I can't help falling in love with you.

Stephen Calabria: From the Mount Sinai Health System in New York City? This is Road To Resilience, a podcast about facing adversity. I'm your host, Steven Calabria, Mount Sinai's, Director of Podcasting. You're hearing the singing voice of a toddler named Jackson, the middle of three children who live on Long Island outside of New York City.

Jackson was diagnosed with severe food allergies when he was 11 months old, specifically dairy tree nuts, peanuts, sesame seeds, and egg. Jackson's allergies have been severe enough that they've altered the lives of both him and his family, even to the point he's experienced several life-threatening anaphylactic reactions in those situations.

It was his mother, Holly, who promptly treated Jackson with [00:01:00] epinephrine, followed by emergency room visits. On this episode of Road to Resilience, Holly shares Jackson's story illuminating the continued severity of food allergies and the lifesaving potential. With clinical trials with Jackson now 11 years old.

Their life together also symbolizes perseverance in the face of ever present threat. We're honored to welcome Holly Estevez to the show. I want

Holly Esteves: let you he say thank you. Thank you.

Stephen Calabria: Holly Estevez, welcome to Road to Resilience. Thank you. It is great to be here. Can you take us back to the moment that you first realized that.

Your son suffered from something that was out of the ordinary.

Holly Esteves: Absolutely. So Jackson was my second child. We were making some spinach pancakes one night. I was serving them up for both of my children. My oldest daughter and Jackson, who was about 10 months old at the time. He had just a couple of bites on his little tray.