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View Full Version : About hives...(Whisperlily?)...


Pencil Pusher
03-05-2008, 02:25 AM
I've never seen hives. I skip over those posts. I guess I'm avoiding bed, but I read the thread about random hives & even clicked on the link to Whisperlily's photo of her son's hives.

OH MY!!! My dh's back & shoulders ALWAYS look like this!

I've mentioned before that dh is allergic to pretty much everything & he's very asthmatic, etc. I've never wondered about his skin, though. I thought...it was just his coloring, poor guy!

His spots don't itch or anything, but still...I googled hives for images, & many of them look very similar to Whisperlily's pic. I was wondering why a dr has never said anything, & then I realized, they're always looking at his ears, nose, & throat. His face looks fine.

So a brief google tells me that there is such a thing as chronic hives (they last 6+ weeks), & I'm thinking if his splotches clear up in one place & break out again in another...I'd never notice, you know? I just don't pay that much attention.

I know dh is allergic to certain foods, such as milk & chocolate, but he did all the needle tests as a kid, & I'm pretty sure he tested as allergic to wheat, too. When we married, he was still eating ice cream & chocolate at will (silly!), just in moderation. :rolleyes: Since then, I've threatened him for those, but wheat he's only cut out once, doing a yeast-free thing.

Ok, I'm rambling, but one more thing. The websites that talked about chronic hives said that these are not usually food-based anyway. (Not that food is the only thing dh is allergic to, by any means.)

So what do you guys think? (On an upside & totally unrelated, dh has only been sick twice since starting his new job back in Nov, & he hasn't missed a single day of work for either of those illnesses! In the 10+ years I've known him, he's never made it a whole month w/out missing a day of work for something. Yay!!!!)

Whisperlily
03-05-2008, 09:26 AM
Well, that picture was hives, but I know if you didn't see it from the right angle you couldn't see that the red areas were raised and puffy. Anywhere he scratched, the finger trails turned into welts. At first glance, that picture could also look like eczema.

My DS gets that way sometimes, too. The skin is dry, scaly and flat, and doesn't itch like crazy. But red and patchy. Usually he doesn't get eczema on his face.

Does the redness go away? Is it bothersome, like a bee sting puffiness, or is it just irritatingly itchy, but flat and smooth?

I forgot to mention that hives are also "fast" they appear and spread, seemingly from nowhere. If my kids get hives, they are going crazy with the amount of itching and it demands attention. ;)