It turns out Ruby is really allergic to pollen. It took me forever to realize it, and I don’t think I ever would have if Eliot didn’t suggest it. She’s been breaking out in itchy hives since the beginning of March. There weren’t many, so it was easy to ignore them. Ruby had decided they were mosquito bites. I hadn’t seen any mosquitoes, but she’d always had pretty significant reactions to mosquito bites, so I wasn’t really concerned. I’m afraid I’m like that with the kids. “Are you bleeding profusely? No? Well then, let’s rub some dirt in it and move on.” But last week, the hives on her arms really started to multiply and the itching was making her (and us) miserable. I was concerned, but not enough to do much more than apply more Calamine lotion and wash her sheets. She wasn’t sleeping well, which is what squashed my blogging for a bit.

Anyway, two days ago, she had hives on her arms, legs and a few on her lovely face. It was time to do something… that didn’t involve taking her anywhere with sick people. Before I sat down to dive into rash images on the computer, Eliot suggested it might be a reaction to the pollen. He said she’d helped him blow the leaves off the driveway and put them into the yard waste bin. We’re in high pollen season here already. When I wipe down the counters, the paper towels are yellow with it. Do people get hives from pollen? Google said yes. It also said a pollen count above 1000 was considered high. I looked up the San Antonio pollen count: 3600 something. Well, now! So we closed all the windows and turned on the AC and crossed our fingers. And sure enough, the hives were fewer, smaller and less red in the morning. And today, after an actual full night’s sleep, they were mostly gone.

I’m not sure how we’ll proceed from here. More googling, I guess. Selfishly, it is kind of nice to have an excuse to put the AC on. Those two days in the 90s almost broke my stingy resolve to keep the AC off until mid April.

Running: 70 minutes with 9 x 2 minutes hard/90 seconds easy

I was not all that speedy today. Perhaps it was the pollen. (Oak Tree Pollen Count: 5720)