Not a Good Start to My Day...

"Your living is determined not so much by what life brings to you as by the attitude you bring to life; not so much by what happens to you as by the way your mind looks at what happens. " ~ Kahlil Gibran

You won't believe what happened to me today. 

Just in the past week I told my Holistic Healer (who is a pharmacist by trade, but now does biofeedback and EVOX therapy * on me -  trying to help me overcome my chronic nausea) that I was allergic to sulfa and that if I had it I would go into anaphylactic shock. I had mentioned this to her because she had wanted me to go as far back in my mind as I could, to find if I had had any traumatic event that might have triggered my original nausea experience. The anaphylactic shock was a trauma and it was as close as I could get to my first experience of nausea occurring. If I did not mention it previously, my first bout of nausea started in 1992, I had dry heaves every morning, would usually get better a few hours after waking, and that lasted for over ten years! Then it miraculously went away for five years until this most recent bout which, unfortunately, never goes away!

Well, this morning when I woke up and saw myself in the mirror I could see right away something was very wrong. My neck and face looked like I was getting sunburned and my eyelids were really swollen. The first thing that came to my mind was that I was going into anaphylactic shock (because those are the beginning symptoms that happened that first time long ago), but my throat didn't feel swollen and I didn't have a headache (those are the next symptoms that occurred in my earlier bout). I went upstairs to have my mom look at me and she could see something was wrong and I told her that I thought I might be having a reaction. She asked if I thought I needed to go to the emergency room and I told her I wasn't sure. I wasn't sure because even though I knew something wasn't right, I didn't know if it was so bad. As I was pondering what to do I could feel my throat start changing - swelling. I then told her that, yes, I needed to go immediately and she needed to take me! 

By the time I got to the E.R. (a fifteen minute drive) everything had gotten worse. My face fully red and hot, everything around my face started swelling and my throat was bad. Fortunately, it was 7:45 in the morning and they got me into a room right away. Finally, the doctor shot me up with three different drugs that would allow for the reaction to end. The only problem with that is that I had a reaction to the medicines that were supposed to help me!

It was so bad, physically, and also, mentally! I was hurting and I was trying to leave my hospital bed to get the hell out of there! The only thing that was making me not run was that I knew I was connected to all these machines and I felt too dizzy to stand! I was going out of my mind! I can almost laugh about it now - I remember it thoroughly - but god, it was scary at the time : (

I now have to be on a dose of steroids for the next four days to make sure the inflammation stays away, but I'm kind of scared to take the meds because I think the steroids are what caused me to have such a bad reaction at the hospital. I am so sensitive to medicine (actually, I'm sensitive in all ways!), but I've been assured that the steroid dose I start tomorrow is not nearly as high as what they pumped into my body today. I hope so... it was bad!

I just find it kind of ironic that I had just told my Holistic Healer so recently of my sulfa allergy, and what happens to me if I have it, and then days later I go into anaphylactic shock! I mean, it's not something I talk about often, and it has been quite a long time since I had my first sulfa episode... a really long time! 

I'm not sure what caused this allergic response. My doctor is out of town so I can't try to figure it out with her, but my pharmacist thinks I either took something with sulfa into my body or I was somehow exposed to it externally. Anyway, I'm exhausted from it all... and because I don't know what caused it this time around, a little bit nervous...

*Deep Sigh* 

*This website is not my Holistic Healer's site, but it has a nice descriptive analysis of exactly what EVOX therapy is, and does.