Sarah Jessica Parker Found Out Son Had Life Threatening Allergy When He Started Breathing ‘Very Labored’

Sarah Jessica Parker loves her children with all her heart. She was delighted when she gave birth to her son James Wilkie Broderick, although there have been some difficulties in raising him.

With her son and two daughters growing up in public, Sarah Jessica Parker makes every effort to raise them “correctly.” The “Sex and the City” actress discovered her son had a severe life-threatening allergy when he was a child.

He could not breathe properly, but their babysitter saved him. The mother of three makes her family a priority, rarely posts her kids on social media, and shares how she coped with such troubles.

Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick at the 82nd Annual Academy Awards on March 7, 2010 | Source: Getty Images

Sarah Jessica Parker loves her kids so much that she tells them that she is happy to be completely distracted and be consumed by the day of their birth. She said,

“The only place I want to be again is the birth of my children.”

When she gave birth to her first child, James Wilkie Broderick, on October 28, 2002, Parker said she looked at her husband, Matthew Broderick, and asked him when they could do it again.

However, Parker, who loves getting things right, said there have been occasional challenges with being a wife and a mother. She revealed that she fell short of being good at both.

She compared the experience to being a golf player in that one can never master it but is in constant competition with themselves. Her son gave her the continuous challenges of having to learn, fail, and triumph. For her, she said raising a son is:

“[…] being befuddled and totally in love.”

Sarah Jessica Parker, Matthew Broderick, and their baby James Wilkie Broderick | Source: Getty Images

PARENTING

Parker believes that when you are responsible for children, not just for what they need but their emotional well-being, it is a ‘whole different beast.’

By earning over one million dollars per episode for the ten-episode series of “Sex and the City” revival, Parker has enough money to buy her children everything they want. However, she still wants them to achieve everything themselves.

She revealed that she has to be very aware of her financial situation because she wants her children not to be mindful of money or worry about it.

However, she is grateful to have a windfall and not worry about her financial situation. Despite having enough to provide for her children, Parker said she likes to withhold things from them. She said:

“Not having everything you want is a blessing. […] Wanting is like a great gift.”

Growing up poor, she had to learn these from her mother. As an adult, she said her mother was sorry they could not have everything they wanted.

Sarah Jessica Parker taking a walk with her son James Wilkie Broderick on February 12, 2014 | Source: Getty Images

As Parker raises her children, she wants them to yearn and pine for things so that they would not be casual about it that it loses its meaning when they eventually get what they want.

Despite her children having everything they need, she does not complain about the burdens of publicity as she knows that some mothers cannot afford the basics for their children.

When dealing with publicity, Parker and her husband talk with their kids about their work, what it means to be a public person, the media, and social media.

They do their best to be honest about the experience so that their children feel comfortable. They describe it with not a lot of emotions. She said:

“We want them to be graceful, generous, gracious people.”

This was also one of the lessons she had learned from her mother. Parker’s mother, whose role model was Rose Kennedy, wanted to raise a family that had meaningful lives.

Sarah Jessica Parker taking a walk with her son James Wilkie Broderick on October 28, 2013 | Source: Getty Images

PEANUT ALLERGY

Before James had his first peanut meal, Parker never guessed that her son would be allergic. She had yet to introduce him to anything with peanuts, but her babysitter did.

While Parker was at the dentist, her babysitter told her that she had fed James with Parker’s leftover cold sesame noodles, a Chinese meal with a high peanut concentration.

In no time, the babysitter realized that James was not alright. According to Parker, the babysitter noticed that:

“His breathing was very labored, his mouth was swollen. That was scary.”

The babysitter did not know what James was reacting to, but she was calm. She used two of her fingers to act as a tongue depressor as she placed it in James’s mouth and noticed that his throat was closing.

She tucked James under her arm like a football and ran to their pediatrician, who immediately noticed that James was suffering from an anaphylactic reaction and treated it immediately.

The next day, Parker and her husband took James to a pediatric allergist, and they diagnosed him with a severe peanut allergy and a less severe hazelnut allergy.

With this knowledge, Parker and her husband are never casual about their son leaving the house with everything he needs. They inform families who invite them over about their son’s allergies.

In addition, with nuts present in many snacks and are a threat to her son’s life, they ensure that James always carries with him two epinephrine auto-injectors, and he always has them on his person.

Parker also has advice for other families with such complex problems or who just had their child diagnosed. She said:

“The diagnosis should be scary, because it’s real and it’s severe and it’s life-threatening, but it should not dictate your life.”

SARAH JESSICA PARKER’S PRIORITIES

As Parker became a parent, her priorities in life changed. She and her husband began to feel that work must play a different role in their lives. Her family and how she spends her time became more critical, and she said:

“My absence is for what.”

When Parker and Matthew married in 1997, they wanted a quiet wedding without publicity and attention. However, for the day, Parker, who was too embarrassed to get married in white, wore a black dress and regretted her decision years later.

Matthew Broderick, James Wilkie Broderick, Tabitha Hodge Broderick, Sarah Jessica Parker, and Marion Loretta Broderick at the opening night of “Charlie and The Chocolate Factory” on Broadway on April 23, 2017 | Source: Getty Images

Parker’s son turned 19 in October 2021, and she took to her Instagram and posted a picture of him to wish him the happiest of birthdays. She wished she could be with him in her caption while calling him a new adult making lasting impressions.

Besides James, Parker, who rarely posts photos of her children, has a set of fraternal twin daughters, Marion Loretta Elwell Broderick and Tabitha Hodge Broderick, born June 22, 2009, via a surrogate.

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