High hives

If you find it enjoyable to have pain, discomfort, and a fairly certain belief that you have only days to live, I highly recommend hives.

I was fortunate enough to experience this, and most everyone I have come across who has shared the experience has the same reaction: shrieking back in horror and saying, "Oh, man..."

It started a few weeks ago. I was working in the yard, and the ring finger on my left knuckle began stinging and swelling up like crazy. I thought I had had a run-in with a wasp or ant, and chalked it up to battle wounds of a yard work warrior.

And then the next week, I was out with the family at an event and the same thing happened. I was barely able to get my wedding ring off as the finger swelled at the knuckle. Two Saturdays in a row, two animals bites, I concluded.

And then the next Saturday came along, and the same thing started happening, this time on a different finger. Pretty sure I was not just getting bitten every Saturday. Clearly, I was allergic to Saturdays with my family.

And then came Sunday morning. When I stepped out of bed, I noticed things felt a little weird, as the arches of my feet were touching the ground, whereas my toes and heels were, well, not. I don't know how your arches work, but mine normally work as, well, arches.

I also noticed that my sides had been essentially clawed apart during my sleep, where sleeping me decided to conquer the itching I was experiencing by peeling my skin off.

I weathered that day the best I could, with my most commonly uttered phrase being, "Yes, I will go to the doctor tomorrow." My wife is one of these types of people who believes medical issues should be addressed by competent medical professionals who have training and education. I agree that is a good alternative approach when my choice of medical care does not work. That choice, of course, is to pretend nothing is wrong and hope everything goes away on its own. The hardest part of this, of course, is keeping from my wife that something is wrong. And when you are walking around the house on the sides of your feet and constantly clawing at your side like a chimp that rolled in poison ivy, it's kinda tough to keep that under wraps.

My wife is very good at pre-diagnosis, and, along with the help of Dr. Google, had surmised that I had hives. When I had consulted with Dr. Google, I diagnosed myself with monkey pox, typhus, swimmer's ear and feline leukemia.

So I went to my dermatologist the next day, and she said that I did, in fact, have hives. (Although come to think of it, she never specifically ruled out swimmer's ear or feline leukemia.) She gave me some medicine that came with a warning that it may make me drowsy.

Hey, here's a fun fact: "May cause drowsiness" = "Mike's about to be in a coma!"

I slept for longer than I have slept in probably 20 years, and was pleased to wake up the next morning and have normal shaped feet. I also do not feel a need to ask people if they could locate a large metal garden rake with which to take off my skin.

Apparently, the cause of hives is often never determined. I haven't had changes in diet, chemicals I'm around, etc. It may just be one of these fluke things that happens. Hopefully, I can treat it and put it all behind me. Of course, if it continues to be a problem, we still haven't ruled out monkey pox.