#allergies tw

[promptsblog]

"If you're not prepared to do the most basic research on your own allergies then I'm sorry, you deserve to die."

[phantomuheist]

"...turns out that I'm actually allergic to something-- probably the AC, and that's why my throat is killing me and I cough so much. My healthy life... is no more."

[hmslusitania]

Why does Ravi give off the "I'm dairy or gluten free but fuck it, I'm gonna have *insert food with dairy or gluten in it*" vibes?????

as someone with a decent collection of food allergies whose effects range from anaphylactic shock to migraines, I have definitely also been known to sometimes take the migraine one and be like "you know what? Fuck it. I do want that thing I shouldn't eat" so I sort of think this is largely a universal experience for people who have those sorts of issues.

Also basically every person I know who's been lactose intolerant has more often than not been of the "fuck it" mentality, so like, if he does deal with those, then yeah for sure

[psycho-mocha]

the human body is a fucking mess tbh

you could survive 3 story fall but die because of undiagnosed peanut allergy

[crystalrainwing]

hey hey hey august can I hear the wasp story?

THE WASP STOR(IES)

i will begin with a small bit of context. my mom used to be fatally allergic to wasps, specifically yellowjackets. i can’t remember what it was exactly but she had something done to make her not allergic to them anymore, or at least barely allergic. my dad has adhd and he also has a pretty skewed sense of danger; he’s very impulsive and these things combined have resulted in some... interesting... things.

THE FIRST (major) WASP STORY, aka my dad makes questionable decisions: part one

i can’t remember whether this was before or after The Wasp Incident but i believe it was before. at this point in time my youngest sister, squid, was probably four or five and EXTREMELY afraid of wasps because of something that happened when she was 2. at our old house, during the summer she wouldn’t go downstairs because wasps lived in our air conditioning and they’d get blown out into the main room down there. anyways. the rest of us didn’t like wasps either.

except, of course, my dad. my dad was and is not afraid of wasps.

outside my parents’ window was a massive wasp nest. one of the bowling- or basket-ball sized ones. mostly they didn’t bother us. my dad once stuck his hand in the nest just for funsies and only got stung like. 3 or 4 times. so. not too aggressive.

my dad, on this day, was leaf blowing our concrete patio. and the window was RIGHT there.

he wondered, what would happen if i stuck the leaf blower in here and turned it on?

so. he did.

we couldn’t leave the house for a day and a half. but the wasp nest was gone, at least, i guess.

THE SECOND (major) WASP STORY, aka my dad makes questionable decisions part two

this was maybe a year ago (so after The Incident). now there’s a kind of hornets called bald faced hornets. we were already familiar with them from The Incident. they’re mostly okay, because they won’t attack until you’re near their home (usually in a tree). but once they do, their venom is particularly painful. (unrelated but every year they’d eat any apples that fell to the ground and they’d get drunk cause the apples were a little fermented. it’s really funny.)

so in our cherry trees was a big wasp nest. we, of course, wanted to eat the cherries but me and my sisters were willing to just. not go near the tree; that particular tree did not in fact grow any cherries. my dad, being unafraid and bored, decided to find a way to get rid of it.

his original plan was to ‘just stomp on it.’ don’t ask me how that would work because i simply don’t know. he didn’t either. that was the end of the plan. notable problems include the fact that it was in a tree and the fact that it was full of wasps.

anyways. my mom told him that was not actually a good plan but tragically couldn’t convince him to just. leave it alone. the revised plan was to 1. go up a ladder to the nest. 2. cut it down with a... knife? saw? i don’t remember. 3. drop the whole nest + the branch into a bucket and finally, 4. shove a lid on the bucket real fast.

he didn’t even make it to step 2.

me and my sisters were outside, a fair bit away, watching. we knew it was going to be terrible and hilarious. and it was! i actually have the whole thing on video, somewhere; if i can find it and it doesn’t have anyone’s faces on it then i might post it here.

so here’s my dad, standing on a wobbly ladder which is right next to a very steep hill (our yard was essentially a downhill, a few feet of flat ground, and another downhill. good for sledding though). on the ground beneath him, the wasp bucket, and in his hand a dull serrated knife.

being who he was he decided to take a look at the wasps and stuck his hand right next to them. ‘oh,’ i hear him say. ‘these guys are aggressive.’

‘oh, they’re really aggressive.’ he drops the knife. the wasps come out.

we (me and my sisters) start running. behind us, my dad is yelling for us to get inside quickly and close the door because the wasps are CHASING him.

well. we couldn’t go outside that evening, but in the end the only consequence was my dad was in a lot of pain and had like, a fever and stuff from the venom (surprise surprise! they were bald faced hornets), and my cat acted drunk cause she got stung too.

pretty big consequence, let’s be real. i think my dad must feel pain less than other people, because... well. we all have learned th hard way how much bald faced hornets stings hurt.

THE WASP INCIDENT, aka a bizarre series of increasingly terrible misfortunes

the day of The Incident was perfectly normal. we went to a river with some friends, which was fun if a bit cold. i don’t remember the time spent at the river.

soon it came time to leave. we had planned on taking a picture together, but well, too bad. we would go home without it. oh, how i wish we would have gone home without it.

my sister, as mentioned before, was terrified of wasps. and there were a few wasps hanging around; we were near water, no big deal. if she saw one she’d scream, though.

into the woods we went, trying to find a place to take a picture (we stayed on the trail, though; there were some very little kids with us).

i clearly remember the moments before Disaster Struck. a 10 year old me found a beautiful flower. some cool mushrooms.

‘oh, here’s a good place for a picture,’ i hear behind me. the parents stood on the trail, while all the kids stood on a slope directly next to it. there was a nice log adding to the picture, it was very aesthetic, i’m sure.

suddenly, squid starts screaming. no big deal, she is five and screams a lot. she just saw a wasp, probably, or maybe hadden pinched her.

there was a little pinch on my leg. stinging nettle? maybe.

another. these hurt too bad to be stinging nettle. i didn’t know what was going on but we all ran down the slope faster than we’d ever run before.

i was feeling terrible pricks all over my body. please understand these were truly terrible. they were enough to bring me to tears with just one sting.

as everybody ran down the trail towards the cars and, presumably, safety, my mom ripped my shirt off for me because THERE WAS A WASP STUCK INSIDE MY SHIRT. once i got it out i understood what was going on - we were being attacked by wasps. everyone else was out of sight, around a bend in the trail, but i could hear their distant screams as i walked slowly and leisurely down the trail, in intense pain. i thought the trees were very pretty, and the sky very blue.

when i got to the parking lot i was met with the sight of my youngest sister, no pants or shirt on, crying hysterically and my friend doing the same. poor squid, five years old and deathly afraid of wasps, had been stung over 12 times by some of the wasps that personally i have found to be most painful. they’d gotten in her clothes.

the end of the story, right? you’re probably thinking. we go home, squid is even more scared of wasps, that’s it.

well, not quite. remember how i mentioned my mom used to be allergic to wasps? specifically, yellowjackets? and only yellowjackets?

as it turns out, bald faced hornets ARE yellowjackets. and in saving my sister from the wasps stuck in her clothes my mom had been stung six. times.

so. here we are. four parents, at least three crying children, in the middle of the woods 2 hours from civilization and, more importantly a HOSPITAL. someone camping nearby had benadryl but no one had an epi pen, and my mom was having an allergic reaction. she wasn’t going into anaphylactic shock, luckily.

but she still needed an epi pen, because she could.

just down the road was a boy scout camp, and for the first time we had good luck - there were people there. and a medical tent. we took her in, they were confused but they gave her an epi pen. i sat in the car with my friend, who was still crying. she gave me licorice. after an hour or so, my mom was fine. and we went home.

in the end everything was okay, and i have a fun story to tell. also happy to report that squid’s fear of wasps isn’t as severe these days, shes 10 now.

anyways. here are three of the reasons im not fond of wasps, and three of my favourite stories to tell friends (sorry to my irl friends who’ve heard this story SO. many times.)

[delimeful]

Just imagining about Wibar Virgil tasting the healthy aliens' food and finding something, not poisonous to him, that he simply found so much disgusting that he needs to wash his mouth and start chugging down something completely lethal to everyone known and they start panicking over him. And he just 'this remember me of soda' and then keep chugging it. He noticed the others distress when Patton tooks the bottle (or whatever that was) from him and start hugging him in fear of loosing Virgil

virgil: *starts desperately clawing at his tongue to get the taste off*

logan: it seems as though we found something that humans are actually vulnerable to. 

patton: D:

roman: :D

virgil, notoriously picky eater: y… yeah…. im totally allergic… dont ever offer me that again please

[fleetwood-mac-andcheese]

On my deathbed, I will demand a feast of all the foods I’m allergic to and just gorge myself! What’s gonna happen? I’ll die! Fuck you, I was doing that anyway!

[ilyism]

hEy uH @ people with allergies,,, what do y’all do when you break out in hives because im having a reaction to lotion so mega yike !