The little birds outside my window get very demanding if I don’t get to their feeders in time and I don’t want one of them hitting the glass so hard they break their little necks so I do my best to stay on top of things.

The outside pups, too, will let out a group howl if I don’t open my bedroom window first thing in the morning to assure them I’m still here, I still love them and it will be their turn soon to sleep in.

If I wait too long to get my morning coffee or medicines my entire day is screwed, so there are lots of things I just can’t ignore or else I pay the price.

A few weeks ago I changed my diet, after having successes eating several formerly “unsafe” foods that would trigger an allergic reaction. Well, not really a true IgE reaction since that’s not how mast cell disease works. Rather I’ll eat something and hours later I go through a slow-motion anaphylaxis aka a degranulation event that can last for days or even weeks. It’s incredibly painful, debilitating and really just sucks.

So I try to avoid reactions as much as possible.

In the last few days I’ve woken up with what looks like ringworms on my legs. I don’t freak out now but when this first started a few years ago I was completely shocked when it happened. I actually thought it was ringworm and tried several different treatments, none of which worked.

Eventually I had a biopsy and found out I have a rare autoimmune condition called granuloma annulare, which I do NOT recommend Googling because they ALWAYS show the worst case scenarios.

Seriously, do that have to traumatize us all whenever we have something go wrong? The only one that really matches what I (also) have is dermagraphia or “skin writing”. A light scratch and hives will appear, which means I can “write” on myself which makes for a fun party trick lol.

And now as I’m older I also get these red rings that form, spread out and then kind of fade but stay visible. It’s BIZARRE! At first I thought it was a hobo spider bite, then Lyme’s disease and then ringworm! It was none of the above.

To make a long story short, it’s part of my mast cell disease although the two are seemingly disconnected. The rings are mediated by tryptase which is what my mast cells excrete in copious amounts when they are malfunctioning. Which makes these rings a sign that something bad is going on with my immune system, even if I feel okay otherwise.

Which means it’s either the paint, which I doubt because it started before I began painting, or I have to give up dairy again since it’s really the only thing I’ve changed. 😥

I still have quite a bit of milk, butter and other dairy products I thought were “safe” but now I’m not so sure. I can’t wait to find out, though, because if it keeps going I can end up in a constant state of anaphylaxis and unable to control it. Some of us will find our medicines quit working if we push our trigger boundaries and I don’t want that!

Sigh.

So it’s goodbye, cheesecake. Again.