Still Itching

Ugh.
I know that I'm much more conscious of the rash and swelling on my face than anyone else is, but even the teenage sons have begun to comment on it.
"Maybe you should stop using it," Tucker suggested.
Yeah, I thought of that and stopped using the moisturizer as soon as I felt the rash beginning on my neck. This all began when I tried a new moisturizer from Aveda. Now five days later, the rash and swelling are worse.
"Your eye's swollen," Spencer said when he leaned over to let me kiss him on the cheek before he ran out the door.
The left side of my face is very swollen now and the skin is very dry. Yesterday, I tried taking it easy and swallowing Benadryl every 6 hours to reduce the itch and swelling. I also tried applying hydrocortisone cream, but I felt nervous about rubbing it on my face.
Today, the left side of my face has definite jowls and the swelling under my eye interferes with my line of vision.
I searched online for a doctor on Sunday and ended up going to a CVS Minute Clinic where a nurse practitioner seemed afraid to touch me, as if the scaly, swollen skin would spread.
She ended up giving me a prescription for prednisone because, by now, the allergic reaction must by "systemic," she said.
I just hope that I look a little better by tomorrow when I have to work one-on-one with students.
Now I just have to figure out what is causing the back pain -- is it some of the medicine I've been taking, the allergic reaction, or the lack of running since my face flamed up from that "all natural" moisturizer.
And that will be my next step, to try to find out what is in the moisturizer that set my face on fire. I definitely want to avoid it in the future.

Wrinkles Be Gone

My husband is so lucky that I woke up with a swollen face this morning. Otherwise, I was going to write about the fact that he came home from France with one chocolate bar. One. That's right. No other chocolate. Three bottles of wine, some croissants and ONE chocolate bar.
Instead of giving him a hard time, I am a little woozy from Benadryl and drinking an espresso to counteract the sleepy qualities.
It all started on Sunday when I bought a new moisturizer. I went to the Aveda store, which I love. Almost all of my "beauty" products are Aveda. And I've been using my travel store of moisturizer since we had the driveway redone in August.
I went to buy my usual tourmaline moisturizer and inquired about eye cream. They didn't have any except the kind I had an allergic reaction to. However, the saleslady continued, I could try the "Embrightenment" moisturizer which would have a similar effect around my eyes. It was 20 dollars more, but if it could work as moisturizer and eye cream, I was really coming out ahead, right?
So I brought it home and used it Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.
Yesterday afternoon, I could feel a slight sandpaper type rash on my neck. As the evening progressed, my skin was itchy and I could feel the rash along my jawline. This morning in bed with my husband, who came home from a week in France and brought only one pre-wrapped chocolate bar, I could feel that sand papery feel over all of my face. And my face felt really tight.
That's when I got up and looked in the mirror.
Yikes!
My whole face was swollen and my eyes had a definite Asian slant to them.
Oh! So that's how the moisturizer works. It gets rid of wrinkles by making your face puff out. I have no wrinkles, but the space between my eyelids is definitely smaller since my eyes are swollen too.
So, I took a Benadryl and I'm drinking the coffee since I have to teach starting at 8.
Then I'll have to head back to the Aveda store to see if they'll replace the rash-causing moisturizer with my old standby.
What I can't understand is that Aveda said it is replacing products to make them more natural. Apparently, my face cannot handle more natural. Bring me some synthetic products!