Reaction to Ibuprofen

Josiah woke up during the night with a low-grade fever so I gave him Children's Ibuprofen at 9:30 this morning. Jan came over to watch the children while I had a dentist appointment. She reported that everything went fine with no incidents of any kind. Just a few minutes after she left I noticed that Josiah had two large spots of swelling on his lips. This happened to be almost exactly two hours after I gave him the Ibuprofen.

My Mommy alarms immediately went off. I thought it was the strangest thing and had nothing to attribute it to. I called the Doctor right away and then my Mom and by then my voice was cracking. Over the next hour his lips puffed up to the size in the picture. He looked like a duck. The inside of his lip was showing on the outside. I kept checking on him every couple minutes just to see how much the swelling had increased.

I left for the doctor as soon as my Mom arrived to stay with the girls. I got to the office early, but just explained that his lips were continuing to swell and I was scared. The receptionist took one look at Josiah and sent a nurse out to the waiting room to check on him. She went for Benadryl and in the meantime we were called back to a room and the nurse practitioner followed us in. She said it was an allergic reaction to something. His breathing was clear. His throat was red, but the rapid strep test came back negative. I felt better knowing that a professional had seen him, but was still had no clue what could have caused such a reaction (besides a bee sting and it didn't make sense that a 3 year old would be stung by a bee and nobody know).

I texted a picture to my mother-in-law who is on vacation and farther away than normal. I didn't want her to worry until I knew what was going on. I talked to her later and told her the story and when I got to the Ibuprofen part she said "that's what it is." She told me that her son, Josh, had the same thing happen to him. It happened a couple times before he figured it out and since then he has not taken Ibuprofen and has not had any more lip swelling issues. I was starting to feel better! I texted a picture to Josh and asked him to call me. I told him briefly and he said, "oh yeah, that looks exactly like me." It baffles me a bit that the doctor wouldn't have suggested that, but....who am I to say. I will never give Josiah Ibuprofen again and it will be added to every allergic list I am responsible for!

Tonight Josiah's lips are considerably improved. I gave him Benadryl again before bed. He is improved enough that I will sleep tonight. After a hyper vigilant day I'm pretty tired tonight!