Cat allergy question - Please help!

We had to go to the hospital at just before 5am yesterday because my boyfriend was having an allergic reaction. At that point, he had hives and his upper lip was very swollen. He also had some stomach pain since mid afternoon and had to use the bathroom more frequently than normal. They gave him an epinephrine shot and then IV benydryl and prednisone. The feeling we got was that it was probably a food allergy. He's never had an allergy to anything before and didn't eat anything new or strange, so we're not sure what it could have been if it was in fact a food trigger. By last night his lip had returned to normal, but he still had hives. He slept terribly and today is totally covered with hives, some of them very big (a couple of inches wide or more). He's been taking oral benydryl, but it only provides slight relief - the hives get a little smaller and/or less itchy, but there's no major improvement. He also took his first dose of oral prednisone a bit ago. We have a doctor's appointment at 3:45 today, so hopefully they'll be able to do something for him.

His biggest worry is that it might be a reaction to the cats. We've only been living together for a month and before that he's never owned one. He did, of course, visit often before we moved in together without incident. He has never shown ANY indication that he's allergic to them before (no sneezing, watery eyes, anything like that) and this came on very suddenly (late tuesday night/early wednesday morning).

I don't know what to think. The swollen lip and stomach ache suggests a food allergy to me, but he's concerned - he loves the cats and doesn't want to have to give them away. Plus, we can't figure out what he could have eaten.

Basically, I just wanted to know if any of you have heard of someone having a cat allergy that presented with these types of symptoms (and without sneezing, watery eyes, etc.....normal cat allergy stuff ) and, if so, how quickly the allergy developed (did it show up overnight, or were there milder symptoms before?). I'd really appreciate any info you guys have to help put his mind at ease. He's very worried about it, as you can all understand.

Thanks very much,
Leli

people who have never had food allergies can develope an allergy...and it can change, i love cucumbers, one time i had an allergic reaction to them and had to go to the hospital, it was only that one time though, i still eat cucumbers and am fine, one month orange juice will give me migraines and the next month i'm ok with it, it's called cyclic allergies...no fun, but i talked to my doctor about cat allergies because i was worried about my son, and he said you would know for sure if it was a cat allergy, he said you would have red itchy eyes, and trouble breathing...you can have allergy tests done to pinpoint the allergy...but i would guess it was something he ate

Originally Posted by meiam

people who have never had food allergies can develope an allergy...and it can change, i love cucumbers, one time i had an allergic reaction to them and had to go to the hospital, it was only that one time though, i still eat cucumbers and am fine, one month orange juice will give me migraines and the next month i'm ok with it, it's called cyclic allergies...no fun, but i talked to my doctor about cat allergies because i was worried about my son, and he said you would know for sure if it was a cat allergy, he said you would have red itchy eyes, and trouble breathing...you can have allergy tests done to pinpoint the allergy...but i would guess it was something he ate

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Thanks, Meiam. I appreciate you replying. I guess I just wanted someone to agree with me about the cat thing, so I thought I might get some feedback here. I know that you can develop an allergy at any time, so it's possible that's what happened in this case. We've just come back from the doctor and he says we'll probably never know what caused it, but it's not from the cats (came on too suddenly, no normal cat allergy symptoms). We're going to try a new antihistamine and some lotion to try to get the hives under control. Anyway, we hope it'll go away soon. Thanks again for taking the time to reply, Meiam.

your welcome...glad to hear it's not your cats! benedryl cream works pretty good on hives good luck