Mangos: A PSA

So, when I went to Summer's house on Sunday, I woke up the following day with a rash on my mouth. I get this rash a few times a year. I'm never totally sure what causes it. It feels like poison ivy, which I'm particularly sensitive to. I always figured that since she lives in the woods, some poison ivy oil floated over onto my lips. I took a picture of the rash, but this is almost a week after I got it, so it is hardly noticeable. It actually wasn't ever very noticeable, except for that it almost drove me INSANE, constantly.



I was trying to think of what could've caused this rash, and the only things besides floating invisible poison ivy I could think of were that I ate a mango, chomping down on the core and pretending I was an islander, and that we laid out in the sunshine. I thought it could've been a sun reaction, who knows.

Anyway, I did some research and I found out the following! DAMMIT! Mangoes are my FAVORITE! I'm thinking that if I discontinue my current practice of slobbering all over the fruit and pretending I live on an island, and if I eat it CAREFULLY with no face contact, and if I thoroughly wash the skin, I might still be able to eat the fruit I love so much? It said the rash could last as long as a couple of weeks. Check this shit out:

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The mango (Mangifera indica), a large tree native to India and
Southeast Asia. This tree is grown throughout tropical regions of the world for its delicious, fleshy fruit containing a large, seed-bearing pit (endocarp). Mango trees belong to the sumac family (Anacardiaceae), along with poison oak, poison sumac and the cashew tree. People who are hypersensitive to poison oak often get a mouth rash from eating mangoes. In fact, there is some evidence that native born Hawaiians and Asians may be less susceptible to poison oak because of early exposure to mangoes.

Are Mangoes Allergenic? Mangoes may be allergenic as many tropical fruits often tend to be. They are not know to commonly cause life threatening allergic reactions however. The type of allergic reaction a Mango may cause is topical or dermatological. A person who has a reaction to Mango will find a rash much like that of poison ivy or poison oak. The rash may occur when the affected person comes into contact with either the sap from the Mango tree or from the skin of the fruit itself. The allergen itself resides in the skin/peel of the mango and not within the actual fruit itself. Eating the mango "meat" or pulp will not cause the rash to get into the throat or tummy per se but if the oleoresin from the peel/skin has touched the Mango "meat", a rash may erupt around the mouth. Some sources say that a Mango allergy may in fact cause a rash around the bottom as the mango is digested and passed through. That being said, there are many pediatricians who say that tropical fruits should be held off until 8 months old and up.