Near-Death Sushi Experience

Yesterday when I got home from doing inventory at work--which meant getting up at the crack of dawn and being on my feet for 6 hours then walking home--my blood sugar crashed so I went to the refrigerator and saw sushi rolls that James had apparently bought the day before. Yay, I thought, just the thing to recover from the crash! We always get the veggie rolls with avocado, carrots, & cucumber because I'm deathly allergic to shellfish. So I mixed up the wasabi and soy sauce, dipped a roll in it, and popped it in my mouth. Chew, chew, swallow. Yum! The second roll went into the sauce and then into my mouth when I happened to look at the label on the package and saw...SHRIMP rolls! WHAT??? We never get shrimp rolls!!! I immediately spit the second roll out, rinsed out my mouth a few times, then went into the bathroom and for the first time in my life—and hopefully the last—made myself throw up by sticking my fingers in my throat. (I could never be bulimic.) I then ransacked the house looking for Benadryl, managing to find 2 which I promptly took.

Not knowing whether there was reason to be dramatic about this—I've successfully avoided shellfish since finding out I'm allergic to them, so I don't know how they'll actually affect me now—I called James at church to let him know what had happened just in case my throat started to swell up or whatever. He was in a meeting but the church secretary, when she heard what had happened, dropped the phone and ran down the hall to get him. Also not knowing whether to be dramatic about this, James decided to cut short his meeting and go buy me some more Benadryl and come home to keep an eye on me. He said to his secretary, "I've never gotten shrimp rolls before—and I forgot to tell Dianne I bought them. Damn!"

With a mega-dose of Benadryl in my system, I went to sleep for a couple of hours. When I woke up, I had a spell of severe intestinal cramping, and then was pretty much o.k. except for some respiratory congestion. This morning I woke up with puffy eyes but otherwise fine. The whole episode made me think that perhaps it's time to get an EpiPen, or at least a medical bracelet. I hate melodrama, and EpiPens and bracelets seem so melodramatic—I mean, really, it's just a little shrimp, for cryin' out loud! But it would be even more ridiculous to end up dying from something as stupid as a little shrimp. Would I rather seem foolishly melodramatic, or foolishly dead? Not really any contest there, I guess.