I had a tough time of it last week. Each morning I woke up feeling like a forced recipient of collagen injections. But it wasn’t just my swollen lips. The inside of my mouth was raw and itchy. Brushing my teeth was agony, and I skipped it a few mornings, thanking The Universe for the fact I work at home.

This was Monday:

As luck would have it, I had just started this online diet thing and I made a lot of little changes in my diet over the past month. Trying to pinpoint exactly which one was causing the problem was tricky. I tried to revert back to my old diet without returning to ALL the calories, but by Wednesday my face was swollen, too.

I was miserable. My sister reminded me of the time this happened when I was a kid. That time, the culprit was Sunny Delight. I pulled up the website and looked at the ingredients and noticed grapefruit. I just finished off a 12 pack of generic grapefruit seltzer and purchased a second box. The have zero calories and I had been drinking 4 a day.

I stopped drinking those right away. I also cut out all citrus fruit, and now I’m mostly back to normal. My gums are still a little sensitive but my head is it’s normal deflated size.

I am bummed, though. I love grapefruit. I love all citrus fruit! I love the smell, I love the taste. I love cooking with citrus. I named my blog after lemons, for one thing. I really don’t want to cut it out of my diet.

I’m hoping that it was a reaction to the fake flavoring in the seltzer that did it. Or even that it was just a result of an overdose. Maybe I can have the real thing in small amounts? Moderation is the key, they say. Meanwhile, I have a grapefruit in my fruit basket but I’m afraid to try my luck and eat it to test the theory.

The really annoying thing is that I was trying to get healthier and find alternatives to… say… vodka. Or wine. So I drink a bunch of fruit seltzer and I get punished for good behavior. Thanks a lot, Universe. You are an asshole.

Things are nearly back to normal now. I haven’t binged on booze as a reaction, though it has certainly crossed my mind. I’ve made some ice tea and I’ve drank a lot of plain old tap water (without so much as a damn lemon slice, like a goddamned savage). I’m trying to keep it all in perspective. Two steps forward, one step back…

But if cutting out citrus completely gives me a case of scurvy I’m buying vodka and making myself a screwdriver. I’m only human, even if it looks like my lips are made of polyurethane.

About Rachel Lewis

I am a writer, ceramic artist, knitter, and stepmom. As a playwright, I had six short plays produced in showcases and festivals in Manhattan, Salt Lake City, and Austin. My full-length play, Locking Doors, was presented by Wordsmith Theatre Company in The New Lab Theatre (University of Utah) in 2005. I co-wrote a teleplay titled “Thank God I’m Atheist” which won the 2015 “No God But Funny” contest founded by the Center for Inquiry. My short nonfiction essay, “It’s Coming Down,” was published by the online literary magazine Halfway Down the Stairs. My essay "The Red Rock Chronicles" was published in Contemporary West magazine. I currently work in pharmaceuticals professionally and write recreationally, but dream of making the transition to write professionally and do pharmaceuticals recreationally. I am a Utah native and live in Salt Lake City with my family and our Goldendoodle. I am working on a collection of humorous non-fiction essays and a second full-length play. Follow me at: rachelclewis.com @rachel_lewis_ut (Twitter) @rachel_lewis_ut (Instagram)

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