Most people wait until near the end of the 4th of July to end up in the emergency room—generally with the assistance of fireworks. But Melissa—always the overachiever—wanted to get the E.R. visit out of the way early.
She is allergic to just about everything on God’s green earth, but the hives she came down with this time were way beyond the norm even by Melissa standards. After toughing it out for a day or two, she said it was time to go get it looked at by a professional.
They hooked her up an I.V. and loaded her up with lots of Benadryl, Prednisone, and Zantac and within literally 10 or 20 minutes the hives were fading away (as was Melissa overall . . . Benadryl makes you drowsy in its over-the-counter form, but high dosages in an I.V. knock you out harder and faster).
Anyway, Melissa is fine and went home with prescriptions to keep the hives at bay until they disappear on their own. No idea what set things off, but after an afternoon nap we went back to the normal schedule and even proceeded to participate in a 4th of July barbecue. I did miss my planned visit to the shooting range, but that’s okay—plenty of weekend ahead.