A few days ago I had another serious allergic reaction. After hemming and hawing a bit over how to respond to my tightening throat (it was a slow tightening, not like last time which happened so quickly there was no thinking involved, only action) I finally decided that it was definitely getting worse and not better, so I called my friend Twila and asked her to take me to the ER.

I grabbed my epi pen, just in case, and we headed to the ER while I explained to Twila how to use this on me if worst came to worst. I walked right in upon arriving at the hospital, and the first thing they asked me was if I had an epi pen. I said “Yes, it’s right here.” They then asked me if I had used the epi pen, which I had not. They looked at me like I was crazy and proceeded to give me a shot of epinephrine, all the while telling me that really, it was ok to give myself the shot, it wasn’t all that bad. The thing was, I’m not all that squeamish about giving my own injection. (I’m not saying I want to, but I’m not stressed about it. I didn’t know if it was bad enough to warrant the use of the epi pen. The reaction wasn’t as scary as the time before; had it been, I would have given myself the shot immediately). Apparently, it was bad enough this time around too.

They gave me quite the cocktail of drugs, completely ignoring the fact that I had just warned them that I really am a featherweight on meds, and within a few minutes I began to react to the odd mix of benedryl, steroids, adrenalin and more adrenalin. I never knew that you could certifiably be both jittery and drowsy at the same time. I fought the urge to sleep as I watched my limbs, and even my stomach muscles (which, coincidentally, I didn’t know I had) uncontrollably jump jive and wail. It was like Parkinson’s meets narcolepsy.

Amazingly, after I’d been good and dosed up by a dr who thought I was reacting to shellfish (haven’t had shellfish in months) he went off shift, and the same doctor I saw last time came on duty, recognized me, and remembered that I said I was a wuss on drugs, and laughed at the doses I’d been given. He asked why I didn’t use the epi pen as he had instructed me last time, to which I could only respond, “ Do you remember how many drugs I was on when you gave me those instructions?” Seriously, I was lucky to have found my way home last time around. I was plastered.

I fell asleep for about an hour and a half, and woke up still jittery. I remained high and jittery for almost 24 hours after that. I was discharged, breathing quite well at about 2 am. Since there was no chance of sleeping, I called my sister in England at three am and talked so fast she had to tell me to slow down because I didn’t make sense. I cleaned the house, stealth cleaned the kid’s room while they slept, and when there was nothing left to clean, I did laps around my living room. About six hours later I crashed and ended up with the worst migraine I’ve had in years.

We have no idea what I reacted to. I have no way of avoiding this in the future. Allergy testing, here I come!