A bit of a rant

Hannah is a lip licker. It has become a bit of a problem since the weather turned cold (okay, now it's warm again, but it WAS cold), and her lips have gotten quite chapped. I was having her put some chapstick on her lips when she complained, but I decided to get her some lovely natural lip balm that I just adore. I especially like the chocolate mint flavor... it smells like Girl Scout cookies!! Her lips kept getting more and more chapped and even looked like she might have impetigo around her mouth. On Saturday night I decided I would put some Vaseline on and around her lips. The idea of putting petroleum on my kids' skin is pretty abhorrent, but I was getting desperate and I thought it might do the trick. However, when Hannah woke up her lips were HUGE. She looked like she'd had collagen injections! I should have taken a picture, but it was too horrifying. I decided it looked like an allergic reaction, and I immediately blamed the nasty Vaseline. I gave her some Claritin and Motrin hoping that one of them would reduce the swelling. After a couple of hours her lips were back to their normal size, but they were still pitifully chapped, cracked, and red. I had Hannah stop using the regular chapstick, I tossed the vaseline, and I started applying the beeswax lip balm liberally and often. By bedtime, her lips were starting to swell again. When she woke this morning, once again they were huge. That's when I decided a trip to the doctor was necessary. By golly, I was going to do SOMETHING about my poor baby's lips!! Then I had another thought. What if she was allergic to the beeswax? Beeswax has bee saliva and goodness knows what else in it. My friend's little girl started having a reaction to beeswax after being stung by a bee, so it's not unheard of. So, we stopped using the lip balm too. I bought some coconut oil to put on her lips, but stopped after the second swelling incident. Now we are swabbing her lips with olive oil (EVOO for you Rachel Ray fans) because that's something I'm quite sure she's NOT allergic to.

Off to the doctor we went, and he agreed that she was having an allergic reaction. He checked her breathing and tongue/throat for swelling and all that was fine. However, he decided that she needed to have an Rx for an epi-pen. I asked for a referral (back) to the allergist for a bee sting test, and we got that appointment set up for two weeks from now. Here's where the rant starts...

I went to pick up the epi-pen at Walgreens after dinner. The little girl at the counter said, "are you going to pay with cash?". I told her "sure". Then she rang it up on the cash register, and I nearly choked. ONE HUNDRED FORTY-FIVE DOLLARS!!!!!!!!!! I smiled and said, "Did you get my insurance card?" Her response?? "Oh, they don't pay anything on that." WHAT!!! ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME???? They won't pay for medicine that will save someone from a life threatening allergic reaction?!?! So, I put it on the credit card, 'cause I don't carry $145 cash on me... I'm truly stunned. That epinephrin better have a 2018 expiration date!