Told You So! Again!

Today I had a moment of clarity.

My allergy to pine nuts, milk, and an active ingredient in chapstick [which I think is eucalyptus, but who actually knows] all evoke different reactions from my body.

I will spare the explanation of the first two, you are welcome, but instead want to discuss the uncomfortably that I call “contact with chapstick.”

It is really a sensation hard to describe, one that my family has accidently misdiagnosed as Poison Ivy, Poison Sumac, Staph infections, or my personal favorite, hypochondria. While I am not saying that I haven’t had any, or all, of these rights of passage, I do believe that had we found this allergy sooner, many a restless night could have been, well, more rested and many a disgusting “solutions” avoided.

A few minutes after my first contact, my lips [or wherever else you might put chapstick…] become extremely dry. This is a dry that no bottled concoction/fire hose can take care of. Think of it as a combination of wind/sun/cold burn combined into one perfectly painful package.

Then, since I would no doubt cake on the chapstick, thinking it would aid my chapped lips, my lips would start to get small bumps in conjunction with an itchy sensation and an odd surface moisture. Think mosquito bite meets dry skin meets small milk mustache. So, we now have a uniquely painful, itchy, bumpy, and moist pair of lips.

Add swelling, extreme redness, and the inability to smile to complete the look, and presto, you have my complete allergic reaction. [Pretty, isn’t it?]

The attempted solutions were calamine lotion, antihistamines, antibiotics, Lanolin [yes, the same lanolin used to aid breast pain of nursing mothers] and a good old “stop complaining, there is nothing wrong with you” all failed and left me alone to answer one of life’s newest unanswerable questions.

Eventually, things would clear up on their own, with little to no explanation as to why. Fantastic.

After I was discussing my [odd, not confirmed, completely real] allergies with a co-worker, I stumbled across an old memory of me, a bottle of that new, cool, spray sunscreen [circa 1995], “sun poisoning,” and my mother.

How could I have never made this connection before?!

Back track. Scene: Summer, 1995.

I was ten and suffering. I had just returned from a lake front weekend with my best friend, per usual, and was experiencing the same symptoms as above.

I was allergic to the sunscreen. I knew it. I insisted. But, alas, it was sun poisoning my mother said. Perhaps we should have put on more sunscreen, my little sun cancer seeker?

No, I was certain it was the sunscreen, but being the naïve, no idea what I was talking about, often talked back, and always-had-to-be-right 9 year old I was, aided in my loss in this battle. [Sound familiar?]

My mother was not convinced. I was forced to play the waiting game to get rid of my mystery disease.

This childhood experience has lead to my extreme phobia of all spray sunscreens, particularly those with orange and blue bottles.

Back to the coworker.

Today after talking to work friend, I ran up the stairs [because mind you I gave up the elevator for lent] and plopped onto my desk chair and started researching.

The connection?

Both chapstick and the type of sunscreen I used have the same active ingrediants.

I told you I was allergic to the sunscreen. God, I was a smart nine year old.