Why does nature want to kill me?

I love the outdoors and despite having a severe allergy to bees, I don't think much about what could happen. The way I have always looked at is I live minutes from a hospital and always (the truth is sometimes...) carry my epinephrine needles with me. That said, if I am stung I will only be aware of my circumstances for a couple of minutes and then my life becomes someone else's responsibility. My friends and family are painfully aware of this and have instructed on what to do. I had always been comfortable with this arrangement, until Gerry and I started doing interior camping trips....this has changed everything.

Last year we had a safe trip in that regard, but in retrospect, I am no longer comfortable burdening Gerry with this. If I did have a reaction while in the middle of the park, it would be Gerry that would be forced to leave me behind and paddle/portage 8-12 hours for help. It just never struck me how bad that could have turned out...what if I ran out of epinephrine and died? Not Gerry would blame himself....no something had to be done before our trip this August.So today I set the "allergy-less" wheels in motion.

I contacted my Doctor and he has refereed me to an allergist that will begin the process of ridding me of my bee allergy for good! It is called being desensitized to the venom. An allergist can administer increasing doses of bee venom over the course of several weeks until the body develops immunity and can tolerate a large dose of the venom. In one study published in 2000 in Clinical Therapy, this immunotherapy regimen was shown to be effective in up to 79 percent of people.

I am waiting 4 weeks to start the process, as I have my marathon in 2 weeks and don't want to do anything to screw that up. If all goes well, I will be allergy free before spring!

Take that mother nature..you B**ch!