When food attacks, it's okay to act rashly

Still Life Of Fruits
Originally uploaded by ♥babybee.

I'm still unsure how it all happened, but as we finished lunch on Thursday we were all sitting in our conference room at work and my head got really itchy. While we were just chatting, I started scratching (which I know you're not supposed to do) and next thing I knew, my chest and arms were covered in red welts. And not just small ones either.

The welts spread to my stomach, back, and legs, and the itches and tingles just wouldn't go away. If they were good tingles I wouldn't have complained, but all I wanted to do was take a bath in calamine lotion.

By the time I got home on the bus, my body was covered in welts, and the bumps had spread to my face. As my eyes puffed up and swelled over, I was worried about going blind and wondered why I hadn't cleaned my room - the floor was covered in obstacles that I soon would be unable to see.

At about 10.30pm, I couldn't stand it anymore. I'd been applying clear calamine gel for hours and it wasn't doing any good. So I called a good friend of mine, an ex-ICU nurse and he recommended I get to the pharmacy and buy some Benadryl antihistamene, and take 2 capsules (because 50mg is what they would give me in the ER anyway). He did pass on the usual warnings about what to do if the dreaded welts decided to invade my airway - get myself to the nearest hospital for an epinephrine injection STAT. Fortunately it didn't come to that.

But after two Benadryl that knocked me out almost immediately, I woke on Friday to see that the welts all over my body had calmed down, but my face was still swollen up like a soccer ball. I was miserable.

And even though I had the day off on Friday and kept myself in social isolation all weekend, I still don't know what caused the outbreak. I didn't eat anything out of the ordinary (other than white bread), and I'm not on any medication that might have reacted with my system.

It's just one of those weird things that happens I guess. But all the same, I'm going to play it safe with foods for the immediate future and just pay attention to what I eat and drink. Because God knows I don't want to have another reaction like that ever again!