ALLERGY MEDICINE: ©ISTOCK; PILL PACKET: NOUN PROJECT
noted.
BAD MEDICINE? the dark side (effects) of allergy medicine WORDS
CARRIE STEINGRUBER
“M
Y SON IS VERY CALM, he is very shy, and he’s not very quick to anger unless you’re his little sister,” jokes Brooke Reimer. “He’s just not the kind of kid who goes off the rails.” Yet two years ago, when faced with an uncooperative Hot Wheels toy, 5-year-old Bryson pulled a Bruce Banner (that’s the mellow scientist who turns into the Hulk, for you moms not familiar with the superhero world). “He pushed over the Hot Wheels track and broke it,” Reimer remembers, “and he just started yelling and crying and screaming. I’d never seen him do that. It lasted like an hour or two.” After that, four or five times a week, some tiny trigger would send mild-mannered Bryson into a rage, Reimer says. And between tantrums, he was mopey and sad. He just wasn’t himself. “I remember asking him, ‘Why are you so angry?’” Reimer says. “And he just started crying, dfwchild.com / may 2020
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