Monday, July 07, 2008

Things you should know: Aleve

Last night we attended a lovely dinner party at a friend's house. There were yummy things to eat, great conversations and lots of laughs (some involving Wayne and a trampoline). Toward the end of the evening, I started developing a little headache. I asked the hostess if she had some Tylenol and she said, no but that she did have some Aleve. I took the recommended dosage with the recommended glass of water, plus a few Wheat Thins.

We drove home, thanked my mom for watching the kids and settled in to watch Kill Bill Vol. 2. While checking my email I noticed my feet were itching, but also saw a big mosquito bite and figured that was it. A few minutes later my hands started to itch.

Is this sounding familiar??

I immediately told Wayne and we started tearing through the medicine drawer/cabinet/etc for some liquid Benadryl and the leftover meds from my shrimp fiasco. We turned up Benadryl tablets and I took two.

Wayne left to get some liquid Benadryl and I laid down and tried to stay calm I the hives spread everywhere. My tongue and lips started to swell, but not in a dangerous way. Wayne returned, I chugged some Benadryl and fell fast asleep.

I woke up groggy and swelly this morning. My hands and feet are still swollen, but the itching and hives have passed.

I wrote a quick email to our hostess asking if anything we'd eaten had been made with or near any shellfish. Nope. I eat Wheat Thins everyday, so I figured they were safe. So I googled Aleve allergies.

Wow! Is that a can of worms. Apparently Aleve allergies are totally common - but its just a brand name for Naproxen which I took after both pregnancies. I couldn't find anything substantial linking shellfish allergies to naproxen allergies, but at least now I know to stick with the Tylenol.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Maybe you're allergic to one of the inactive ingredients in Aleve? They should all be listed on the container. I know when I was working in DeLand and testing that stuff, some of those chemicals are extracted from seaweed and algae.