The mystery of the killer comforter...

It all started with Keyvan leaving town for a 4-day trade show in Minnesota. I thought to myself "what a perfect opportunity to redecorate our bedroom!" (not only because I thought it might be a fun surprise, but also because I have learned that redecorating is one of Keyvan's least favorite pastimes, so it is best done in his absence). You see, I don't keep our bedroom clean because I don't think it looks good clean or dirty...so I figure why exert myself when it will be ugly either way? But that is beside the point. The point is, I decided to redecorate the bedroom.

So, Keyvan left town early Tuesday morning, and early Wednesday morning Evejuice and I arose and ventured off to Orem for a long day of shopping with my good friend and sister-in-law, Stephannie. We perused a variety of home decor stores (only the cheap ones, of course): Tuesday Morning, Ross, JoAnn's, Burlington Coat Factory, and TJ Maxx. I made several purchases, among which was a comforter set from TJ Maxx. As soon as I arrived home, I removed the comforter set from its plastic case and excitedly arranged it on our bed, so that I might scrutinize it. I decided it was pretty cool, and left it there on the bed and went downstairs to eat dinner with Stacie, who had come over to keep me company. After dinner, Stace and I drank chocolate peanut butter shakes and put in a movie.

Now, this is where things start to get ugly. Evejuice began complaining loudly and interrupting the movie, so I, being a conscientious and knowledgeable Registered Nurse, gave her a few sips of my shake, which contained both peanut butter and chocolate soy milk.

In my defense, I had accidentally given her a lick of peanut butter before and had noticed no negative reactions. As for the soy milk, I have no defense. However, I do not believe the events that transpired a few hours later were a result of this careless culinary mistake, and I will tell you why.

After Eve ingested several highly-allergenic foods, she and I wrestled for another 30-45 minutes as I tried to get her to fall asleep. (At no point during the wrestling did I notice any sort of allergic symptoms). Finally, I took her up to our bedroom, she drifted off, and I came back downstairs to watch the movie.

During the movie, I kept feeling the need to check on her. I am a paranoid mother and tend to check on Eve several times whenever she naps, but I seem to remember checking on her every 20-30 minutes throughout the entire movie. The bedroom was dimly lit, so I couldn't see much of her features, but I could see that she was breathing, which is what I usually check for.

Near the end of the movie, I went to check on her and she woke up, so I brought her downstairs with me and nursed her on the couch while we finished up the movie. She nursed very cooperatively and then laid drowsily next to me until the credits began scrolling across the screen. In the dim light of the credits, I could see that her eyelids were sticking out in a strange way. I jumped up and turned on a light, and, to my horror, saw that my pretty little Eve resembled a bright red marshmallow. Her normally big, bright eyes were so puffy that she could barely see out of them, and her small little elf ears were twice their usual size and appeared to be glowing. Now, being a conscientious and knowledgeable Registered Nurse, I immediately remembered that I had given my child potentially allergenic foods just a few hours before and quickly convinced myself that she was beginning to go into anaphylactic shock. I announced to Stacie that we needed to rush to the emergency room, pulled a shirt on (no bra, mind you), and drove to Mountainview Hospital.

I felt a little bit stupid when the receptionist asked me if I worked outside of the home, and I had to admit that I was a nurse. Anyway,

I calmed down once I realized that no one seemed very alarmed by my daughter's appearance, and Eve didn't seem to mind either. She was jabbering, smiling at the receptionist, and scratching herself vigorously. No tears or complaints. What a funny and wonderful child.

We waited about 20 minutes to see the doctor. She checked Eve's lungs and throat, and determined that her airway had not been affected. She told us that Eve seemed to have nothing more than a skin rash, and began asking me about Eve's day.

That's when I remembered the comforter! As we inspected Eve more closely, we noticed that she had a mild rash on other parts of her body, but she had only broken out in areas that were not covered by her diaper and clothes. The doctor said the allergy could have been caused by anything, but agreed that the comforter was the most likely culprit. It seemed that Eve's vigorous scratching of her eyes and ears probably worked whatever chemicals or dyes may have been in the unwashed comforter into her eyes and ears, causing them to react more intensely than the rest of her body. They gave Eve some Benadryl and Zantec and sent us on our way at around 2:00 am.

We drove to Walmart (because Walgreen's is not 24 hours, just so you know...neither is Smith's. Plus, Stacie and I enjoy trips to Walmart because we see interesting people and things) to buy some children's Benadryl, because the ER doc instructed me to give Eve Benadryl for 4-5 days, just to make sure the reaction did not return. When we returned home, we stuffed the evil comforter back into its plastic prison, stripped my bedroom of linens, and moved my mattress into a neighboring bedroom. When we crawled into bed at 4:00 am, Eve's eyes were beginning to look a little better. By Friday morning, she was basically back to herself (minus being a little crankier than usual...probably because of the around-the-clock Benadryl?)

Anyway, I believe there are several morals to this story:

1) Never let your husband leave town

2) Never buy comforters from TJ maxx

3) Always wear a bra

4) Okay, okay...and be careful what you feed your infants, especially until they are at least a year old and wash EVERYTHING before you let your baby touch it. Oh, and have insurance.

Here is a picture of the poor Evejuice on her first night in a hospital. I am usually opposed to posting unfortunate pictures of myself, but I really feel like my face says a lot in this one:
































Personally, I thought she was beautiful even puffed full of histamine, but here is a picture of the original Eve, just so you can remember what she usually looks like: