Dear Internet,
Benadryl is a cruel and demanding mistress.
TheHusband and I dove into chocolate bars last night, rescued from the cabin this past weekend when we cleaned it out for the winter, with the intent of having a late night snack. TheHusband, his will and stomach of pure iron, was fine. I, on the other hand, started going to into allergic sensitivity mode: My throat started closing, I started scratching, and I was trying not to panic.
In hindsight, I SHOULD have used my EpiPen, but I doubled down on the Benadryl and waited for it to kick in before making any formal decisions, my throat started relaxing and I eventually fell asleep.
This is not the first time this has happened to me, but it is becoming more frequent. Some of it is my own stupidity: Eating a milk chocolate bar when the first ingredient is milk fat or having a slice of Chicago style pizza, but others times it seems overly innocuous when eating a candy/spiked water/crackers/chips where milk/whey/lactose are so far down the list and ergo in minute proportions I don’t even think it would be harmful but yet. Yet here come the symptoms and the signs, and the double dosing of Benadryl.
This is the second time in a month I’ve called in sick due to the effects of my stupidity: Eat something I’m not supposed to, start early stages of anaphylaxis, drug up to cure it, and surrender to whatever effects the drugs give, and then fall asleep. I slept 12.5 hours after taking the Benadryl last night, waking up long enough in the morning to email work I wasn’t coming in and then I was back down for the count.
I always feel so off and surreal when the drugs empty out of my system, not quite 100%. Hell, not quite 50%.
Two years ago I revealed my diagnosis of my dairy allergy and for the better part of that time, I’ve been mostly good. Lately, I’ve gotten fast and loose on what this allergy means when I’m starving at work, nothing is open except the vending machines, and I want some kind of crunch. Hello Doritos. When there is no repercussions, then, of my indulgences or if the repercussions are small, I store that bit to remind me it could be okay to eat Doritos/spiked water/whatever again.
According to my allergist, the milk protein is so fragile, that being able to eat pizza makes sense since there is so many processes into making it while eating ice cream, which is hardly processed, sent me into various sick modes. Why eating chocolate cake at a restaurant was fine, while eating bars of chocolate is not.
It would seem most prudent then to stop eating/drinking/using anything that contained milk in any forms or context, which means going back to being strict even with non-food stuffs.
I never want to go through this again, Seymour. Never again.
xoxo,
Lisa