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mellymellSo, despite watching a lot of DIY this weekend, we resisted the urge to take on some project and decided for the first time in a long time to just go with the flow on a holiday weekend and not make any major plans. That's probably a good thing, considering what wound up happening. The only plan we really made was to check out the Franklin Jazz Festival on Sunday evening, hoping to catch Reggie Wooten. Well, we caught one song of his as he was playing between sets on the main stage. Other than that, we had time to have some dinner (fantastic pulled pork sandwiches from Pig and Pie which used to be in the Bellevue Center Mall when, you know, things were still in the Bellevue Center Mall). But Jonah was extremely antsy. He wanted to run free, but there were just too many people to let him do that and he wouldn't stick near us. He's a little too brave when it comes to crowds of strangers. Add to that the fact that he was hot and tired and we had one cranky baby on our hands. We left at about 7:45 and he went straight to bed that night.
Well, we stayed up a bit and headed to be at around 11 or so. At about 11:30, I suddenly started itching like crazy in the back of my neck. The itching then quickly spread to my scalp. It was one of those crazy neurotic sorts of itches where the more you scratch the more you itch and then you think you're loosing it. About that time, I noticed my ears started to feel swollen and numb a bit. So I hopped in the shower thinking maybe it was something on my skin that if I could get it off, I could stop the reaction. Well, by the time I got out of the shower and got dried off, I noticed this red rash spreading rapidly over my entire body and little hives popping up everywhere that the itching was the worst. I got Chris out of bed to see if he'd go hunt me down some Benedryl. I didn't think I should be driving since by now, I was feeling a little disoriented and felt I had to concentrate to control my breathing and heart rate. I had this nervous feeling, was shaking a little and was sort of nauseated. My motor skills, especially find motor skills seemed very impaired and I felt like I was fiddling a lot to try to get dressed or anything else for that matter. While Chris was gone hunting Benedryl (which isn't easy out here, nothing seems to stay open 24 hours in Bellevue and he finally found a gas station that had a couple of doses for sale), I decided to look up my symptoms online to see if I could get some guidance on what I should do about this. I've never had a reaction like this and wasn't sure if I should go to the hospital or not. After reading a couple of pages that listed my symptoms like a checklist (I was only lacking a couple of them), both suggested calling an ambulance when you witness these symptoms I decided to wake up Jonah and get ready to go to the ER once Chris got home. Chris was a little reluctant and I must say the prospect of sitting in an ER waiting room for god knows how long at 1am didn't sound too appealing to me either and I was kind of hoping to avoid it. Chris looked up some things as well and suggested I call a couple of ERs to see what they said about it. Well, apparently nurses you talk to over the phone are legally allowed only give you one piece of medical advice over the phone, "you may need to go to the nearest ER." Well, we all reluctantly got ready, I took some of the Benedryl hoping to stave off a potentially worsening situation and Chris drove us all to Vandy's ER (not the closest, but the cheapest for our insurance, and since I didn't feel it was getting worse fast enough to be an emergency and didn't seem to have difficulty breathing, I could wait the extra 5-10 minutes to get to Vandy past St. Thomas).
Well, by the time we got there, at least the torturous itching had subsided, but I still had a splotchy rash, my ears and the back of my neck felt swollen and anywhere there was rash there were still remnants of hives and my skin felt numb. After about a 15 minute wait, I got called back by the triage nurse to take my vitals and ask a bunch of questions about what happened thus far. After that, she led me back to an exam room where an RN came in to ask more questions followed up about 15 minutes later with a doctor who asked yet more questions. Basically they told me that since there had been no change in foods I had eaten, no evidence of an insect bite and no change in soaps or detergents I was using, we probably weren't going to figure out what caused it. On a reassuring note, he said most of the cases of this sort of reaction never happen again and the cause is never known. By this time, I think the Benedryl was really working because the hives were starting to disappear and the rash was becoming more and more splotching and starting to subside. When I told him my tongue and throat felt a little swollen, he wanted to take a look and noticed my throat was really red. It was quite sore, but I've had sinus drainage all week and it's been irritated most of that time. I was pretty thirsty at that point too and my throat was dry. Just on the off chance though, he took a swab from it and ran a strep test. Other than that, he ordered some prednisone and told me to continue to take the Benedryl if I still had symptoms. So, I wait another 30 minutes or so, trying not to fall asleep where I was sitting and the RN comes in with the first dose of prednisone. Another 30 minutes after that and the discharge nurse comes in to give me my orders and have me released. I swear that was the longest two hours I've ever experienced, and I'm sure it was even longer for Chris. Jonah at least was a trooper about being woken up in the middle of the night. We tried not to be panicky at all as to not make this a traumatic experience for him. I tried to just wake him up and get him dress like we were going anywhere. Of course, I didn't really understand what was going on either or how bad it could get, so I tried not to think the worst myself. We got home at about 4am and I put him straight to bed, Chris and I had a little snack and then we finally went to bed. Jonah of course woke up at 8:30am that morning, but I got up with him and let Chris sleep in, since he was so awesome to wake up and take care of me the night before.
So, 2 hours in an ER and $104 later (ER copay plus a $4 5 day prescription of prednisone), we have no idea what caused it or the likelihood of it happening again. Yesterday all signs of the rash and pretty much all of the swelling was gone. There's a tender spot behind my right ear where the swelling was the worst, but I'm not finding any evidence that there was a bite or a specific reaction there. In any case, it was pretty scary, not knowing how bad it could get and never having been through something like that. It wasn't very reassuring that there's basically nothing I can do at this point to make sure it doesn't happen again. They did say if it does start happening, they can order allergy tests. But even then, the doctor said about 50% of the time they never find the cause. I couldn't help but think of poor Laura during all of this. You totally have my sympathy!
Anyway, yesterday was pretty much spent recovering, or at least the first half of it was. The second half of the day, I spent on my feet trying to get laundry done and cooking and cleaning and such. My legs were quite sore by the time I made it to bed last night (which was at about 8pm, right after we put Jonah to bed). I didn't run yesterday, but I've decided since Chris wants to run with me on the weekends that I'm going to make Mondays and Fridays my rest days. It's going to be tough today to pick up with an increase after three days being down, but I've got to do it! We both got new shoes over the weekend and we're both having second thoughts about them. I'll know for sure after a run though how mine are going to work out and if they're going to work out. I slept so well last night though. I'm pretty sure I didn't move a muscle all night. I woke up in the same position I fell asleep in and didn't even notice when Mogwai decided to start using me as a pillow.
Well, we stayed up a bit and headed to be at around 11 or so. At about 11:30, I suddenly started itching like crazy in the back of my neck. The itching then quickly spread to my scalp. It was one of those crazy neurotic sorts of itches where the more you scratch the more you itch and then you think you're loosing it. About that time, I noticed my ears started to feel swollen and numb a bit. So I hopped in the shower thinking maybe it was something on my skin that if I could get it off, I could stop the reaction. Well, by the time I got out of the shower and got dried off, I noticed this red rash spreading rapidly over my entire body and little hives popping up everywhere that the itching was the worst. I got Chris out of bed to see if he'd go hunt me down some Benedryl. I didn't think I should be driving since by now, I was feeling a little disoriented and felt I had to concentrate to control my breathing and heart rate. I had this nervous feeling, was shaking a little and was sort of nauseated. My motor skills, especially find motor skills seemed very impaired and I felt like I was fiddling a lot to try to get dressed or anything else for that matter. While Chris was gone hunting Benedryl (which isn't easy out here, nothing seems to stay open 24 hours in Bellevue and he finally found a gas station that had a couple of doses for sale), I decided to look up my symptoms online to see if I could get some guidance on what I should do about this. I've never had a reaction like this and wasn't sure if I should go to the hospital or not. After reading a couple of pages that listed my symptoms like a checklist (I was only lacking a couple of them), both suggested calling an ambulance when you witness these symptoms I decided to wake up Jonah and get ready to go to the ER once Chris got home. Chris was a little reluctant and I must say the prospect of sitting in an ER waiting room for god knows how long at 1am didn't sound too appealing to me either and I was kind of hoping to avoid it. Chris looked up some things as well and suggested I call a couple of ERs to see what they said about it. Well, apparently nurses you talk to over the phone are legally allowed only give you one piece of medical advice over the phone, "you may need to go to the nearest ER." Well, we all reluctantly got ready, I took some of the Benedryl hoping to stave off a potentially worsening situation and Chris drove us all to Vandy's ER (not the closest, but the cheapest for our insurance, and since I didn't feel it was getting worse fast enough to be an emergency and didn't seem to have difficulty breathing, I could wait the extra 5-10 minutes to get to Vandy past St. Thomas).
Well, by the time we got there, at least the torturous itching had subsided, but I still had a splotchy rash, my ears and the back of my neck felt swollen and anywhere there was rash there were still remnants of hives and my skin felt numb. After about a 15 minute wait, I got called back by the triage nurse to take my vitals and ask a bunch of questions about what happened thus far. After that, she led me back to an exam room where an RN came in to ask more questions followed up about 15 minutes later with a doctor who asked yet more questions. Basically they told me that since there had been no change in foods I had eaten, no evidence of an insect bite and no change in soaps or detergents I was using, we probably weren't going to figure out what caused it. On a reassuring note, he said most of the cases of this sort of reaction never happen again and the cause is never known. By this time, I think the Benedryl was really working because the hives were starting to disappear and the rash was becoming more and more splotching and starting to subside. When I told him my tongue and throat felt a little swollen, he wanted to take a look and noticed my throat was really red. It was quite sore, but I've had sinus drainage all week and it's been irritated most of that time. I was pretty thirsty at that point too and my throat was dry. Just on the off chance though, he took a swab from it and ran a strep test. Other than that, he ordered some prednisone and told me to continue to take the Benedryl if I still had symptoms. So, I wait another 30 minutes or so, trying not to fall asleep where I was sitting and the RN comes in with the first dose of prednisone. Another 30 minutes after that and the discharge nurse comes in to give me my orders and have me released. I swear that was the longest two hours I've ever experienced, and I'm sure it was even longer for Chris. Jonah at least was a trooper about being woken up in the middle of the night. We tried not to be panicky at all as to not make this a traumatic experience for him. I tried to just wake him up and get him dress like we were going anywhere. Of course, I didn't really understand what was going on either or how bad it could get, so I tried not to think the worst myself. We got home at about 4am and I put him straight to bed, Chris and I had a little snack and then we finally went to bed. Jonah of course woke up at 8:30am that morning, but I got up with him and let Chris sleep in, since he was so awesome to wake up and take care of me the night before.
So, 2 hours in an ER and $104 later (ER copay plus a $4 5 day prescription of prednisone), we have no idea what caused it or the likelihood of it happening again. Yesterday all signs of the rash and pretty much all of the swelling was gone. There's a tender spot behind my right ear where the swelling was the worst, but I'm not finding any evidence that there was a bite or a specific reaction there. In any case, it was pretty scary, not knowing how bad it could get and never having been through something like that. It wasn't very reassuring that there's basically nothing I can do at this point to make sure it doesn't happen again. They did say if it does start happening, they can order allergy tests. But even then, the doctor said about 50% of the time they never find the cause. I couldn't help but think of poor Laura during all of this. You totally have my sympathy!
Anyway, yesterday was pretty much spent recovering, or at least the first half of it was. The second half of the day, I spent on my feet trying to get laundry done and cooking and cleaning and such. My legs were quite sore by the time I made it to bed last night (which was at about 8pm, right after we put Jonah to bed). I didn't run yesterday, but I've decided since Chris wants to run with me on the weekends that I'm going to make Mondays and Fridays my rest days. It's going to be tough today to pick up with an increase after three days being down, but I've got to do it! We both got new shoes over the weekend and we're both having second thoughts about them. I'll know for sure after a run though how mine are going to work out and if they're going to work out. I slept so well last night though. I'm pretty sure I didn't move a muscle all night. I woke up in the same position I fell asleep in and didn't even notice when Mogwai decided to start using me as a pillow.
