After Allie woke up from her long nap on Sunday, I thought I’d introduce peanut butter to her, as she’d been eating so well and is now well past the recommended age of 12 months for trying peanuts, a high-allergen food. So for her afternoon snack, I spread some all-natural, no-sugar-added organic peanut butter on a slice of sprouted whole grain bread, and started giving her pieces. She seemed to enjoy it, although she did need to chug a bit of milk during the snack. I didn’t give her the whole slice, and she had the equivalent of maybe a teaspoon of peanut butter, when I decided that was enough fat and carbs for now and switched her to some cut melon. Mr. W winked at Allie, and she in turn clenched both eyes, then put her index finger into her left eye, which Mr. W laughed at, thinking she was trying to wink one eye but unable to do so without some help from her finger. Allie was a few pieces into the melon when she started pulling the melon out of her mouth, refusing to eat any more. She kept digging her fingers and fists into her left eye, which had gotten red, and my attempts to get her to stop just make her fussy. I was observing her closely for peanut allergies, and noted two or three small red bumps appear on her chin. I fed her water, concluded snacktime and asked Mr. W to help clean up her hands and face while I cleared the table and washed her dishes. I noticed her left eye was now swollen, watery and red, but it may have been Allie digging her fingers in there that caused it.

Soon my parents came over for their weekend visit, and Allie’s mood was good as she ran around playing with them. I saw a tiny white bump on her temple, like a bug bite. Soon I noticed another on her cheek, then on her neck. In another half hour, the raised bumps were everywhere I could see skin, surrounded by redness, and Allie was absently scratching her ribs. Mr. W stripped her to check her body, and with horror we saw that the bumps and the red rash were on her neck, torso, back. Her ears were also growing red, as with her cheeks where more bumps had appeared.

I got Allie’s medical card and dialed the number for the advice nurse. While I was lost in the maze of push-button options, my mom noted that Allie’s hands were growing pink and swollen. The rash grew and spread, the pink parts getting pinker. Mr. W bolted out the door to the store for Children’s Benadryl. I had finally gotten through the phone options to be put on hold for a live person, so I put the phone on speaker and set it on the desk, then went to my daughter who was now crying for mama. As soon as I was with her, she was fine, and I made sure she wasn’t having respiratory issues or other signs of discomfort. So far the only symptoms were the bumps, redness, and swelling of hands, feet and ears.

Mr. W soon returned with the Benadryl and I was finally on the line with a live advice nurse after 15 minutes of being on hold. She had me check for signs of fever, lethargy, disorientation, breathing difficulty, oral swelling, behavioral change. They were all negative. She told me I could go ahead and administer 3/4 teaspoons of the Children’s Benadryl to help alleviate the rash but that it could take up to an hour to take effect and it could also make Allie drowsy. Since the bumps had already flattened and all that remained was the pinkness around where the bumps used to be, I decided to let nature run its course instead of drugging Allie unnecessarily. She definitely didn’t seem uncomfortable. When the nurse ended the call, she told me to call back or bring Allie to a doctor if the rash deepens to red or purple with pinhead-sized red dots, and to not feed Allie peanut butter anymore. Of course, not. Never, ever, ever, I vowed, only half-jokingly.

We carried on as normal and about 45 minutes later, I fed her dinner. For Allie’s dessert, I fed her the pieces of the yellow-skinned, white-fleshed melon imported from Brazil that she didn’t finish while having her peanut butter and bread snack earlier. This time she ate it without protest, but a few pieces in, within a minute after she started the melon, her ears flamed red and swelled to the point where the outer ridge was barely discernable, her hands and feet swelled and got pink and hot wrist- and ankle-down, bumps appeared around her neckline with a vengeance, her cheeks flushed. She started digging her fists into her eyes again, rubbing violently. Both eyelids swelled. I immediately pulled her out of the high chair and said to Mr. W, “It’s the melon! It’s the melon!” We fed her water, and Mr. W immediately administered the Benadryl. She sucked on the oral syringe playfully, but as soon as she tasted it she gagged. Some of it dripped out onto her shirt as she whimpered, but the swallowed most of it. We checked her body again, and saw that her entire torso was flushed hot pink down into her diaper area, which we also examined and saw that it looked like she had a diaper rash (altho her skin wasn’t sensitive the way it is when she gets a diaper rash), one that went all the way down to her lower inner thighs nearly to her knees. She was also red behind the knees, inside her elbows, under her arms. Behavior-wise, she again acted indifferent to the changes.

45 minutes to an hour later, Allie was much better and there was only mild pinkness around her cheeks and the areas that sustained the most severe rashes, and her bumps were gone. Allie nursed at bedtime and fell asleep, and slept through the night as usual. Mr. W recalled that the bumps I’d initially noticed on her chin during snacktime had appeared when she took her first bite of the melon and the juice dribbled down her chin, so he also thinks it’s the melon.

“What kind of melon IS that?” people wanted to know when I relayed the story. I don’t know; it was something we bought in an international grocery market Friday evening and all the sticker label said was “melon” and that it was imported from Brazil, and that it was ready to eat and delicious. The flesh inside was similar to that of honeydew, but whiter and less sweet. The yellow-skinned melon she had twice on Saturday without issue, but the third time on Sunday she reacted within half an hour, and the 4th (and last) time, within a minute. Crazy! I should’ve followed the 3-day rule when I introduced this melon, but because she’s never had a food allergy problem before, and also because has eaten similar melons (honeydew and cantaloupe even the day before) without issue, I really thought it’d be fine. So now even though we suspect the melon, I guess I don’t know that it wasn’t somehow peanut-related as well or in addition.

I’ll try the skin-contact allergy test at some point, I suppose. I feel bad doing it so soon after her reaction, so maybe I’ll wait a few more days, then rub some melon on her skin and see if there’s an eruption. And maybe a month later, I’ll rub some peanut butter on her skin. We’re hoping it’s the melon and not peanut butter, because it’s certainly easier to avoid exotic melons than to avoid peanuts, peanut oil, peanut butter, etc. *sigh*