Burns and blisters after using red lipstick/face paint... anyone?

[Adair]

My dd and ds had great fun on Sunday morning playing with the last of the Halloween face paints, and in particular dd used a red 'lipstick' that she hadn't used before (all over her face). They were taken straight up for a bath where we attempted to get it all off...

Then Sunday night she complained of headache, woke up with red and swollen face. Swelling went down with Piriton but she had blisters (like burns) all over her face (mostly where the lipstick was)

Took her to doctor who confirmed allergic reaction, prescribed more piriton. She is ok in herself but has to stay off nursery so she doesn't get it infected...

Has this happened to anyone else? She has never reacted to face paint before. What the hell was in the lipstick?

Could there have been nut oil or lanolin? Hope she's better soon. If you could see the brand then you may be able to google for a list of ingredients.

The sort of facepaints that are a hard cake that you have to wet with water and a brush or sponge are usually fairly safe. A bland powder-base, colours, and water. I've facepainted children with eczema - always checked with a parent first, and they were absolutely fine with it. Obviously this isnot a general rule, only my limited experience.

'Lipstick'-type facepaints, OTOH, are generally oil or wax-based, and have very different ingredients. So it's perfectly reasonable that she could react to the lipstick but not the paints.

Also, what didyou use to remove it? Could shehave been reacting to that, rather than to the lipstick?

My son has reacted with burns/blisters to face paints before, from a festival facepainting stall.

I was really shocked. AFAIK he isn't allergic to nuts or anything else but it must have been something in the ingredients...he just had like water blisters, which left red marks, they have faded which is a relief.

Ennis, that's exactly what she has.

She is not allergic to nuts (or anything afaik!) so maybe Lanolin? Is that in anything else?

Have emailed Tesco to ask for ingredients (have no packaging). Have been wracking brains but only used usual baby bath and nothing else to remove (hence why it didn't all come off though most did). She has had the stick ones before and they've been fine, I am 95% sure it is the red one that was sold as a 'lipstick' so will wait to hear from Tesco I guess.

Sounds like I have been an irresponsible mummy then . Didn't expect a face paint sold over the counter to cause facial burns, really.

It's not your fault

I was up in arms about the facepainting when it happened to ds

there should be a warning on the stall, they should mention that it can cause this reaction.

Who knew!
I took ds to the Dr, I also called trading standards who weren't interested.

However tesco should put a warning on the packaging. That's the least they can do.

Your not a bad mummy - don't be so hard on yourself. I suffer from weird and wonderful allergies and even as an adult I get it wrong sometimes the strangest of things have things in that cause a reaction and you don't expect. Also as I've got older some things that used to cause me a severe reaction now its milder.

My favourite was extra sensitive Olay. Ended up at the doctors as my face puffed up so much I couldn't open my eyes.

My eldest had a severe reaction to Apricot fromage frais at about 9 months - blotchy swollen face. It was the apricots. A couple of years on, he can tolerate apricots without a noticeable reaction so long as I don't let him eat more than a half an apricot or he gets blotchy.

Get into the habit of having some Piriton in (but sounds like you already did) and maybe some E45 or similar for when the reaction starts to go down.

Dd is very allergic to facepaints which is a bit of a problem as she dances a lot and nextmonth in her show is doing a Cats song & dance.

Some colours are worse than others and some brands.

I havae manages to find a brand of specialist stage make-up which also does face paints called Grimas which she is OK with. I am also patch testing her with Kryolan which did cause a little redness but no wehere near as bad as Snazaroo.

For Halloween I actually managed to totally greenify her using normal eyeshadow. Used a whole one but better than her reactong to green facepaint.

The company I got the Grimas stuff from (showmakeup.com) were very, very helpful by the way. They explained whichproducts were least likely to cause allergies but did say that anyone can be allergic to anything.

They told me to patch test for 24 hours in the crook of the arm. this area is as sensitive as the face but not visible if a reaction occurs.

You have not been a bad mummy!

Accidents happen. Nobody knows they are allergic to something until they have a reaction. You can even have a one-off reaction and never react to that thing again. You may fnd tha a reaction is only triggered by a certain combination of factors.

Even if there was a waning on the packet, it would not tell you about your own child.

My daughter used to have the same reaction to nearly all face paints, or any stage make-up used at the ballet school, eyes closing up, blistering looking skin. We learnt not to use them pretty quickly. Now she is nearly seven, she seems to be growing out of it and in the last year has been painted at two parties without the severe reaction. She still gets a reaction to some things, but it has got better, hope the same happens to you.

my grand daughter had her face painted with face paints purchased from tesco. She has had a reaction...never happened before ...she is 7 & had her face painted several times in the past & been fine. Her face started to swell...we removed the paint & her skin was all red & very swollen...off to the emergency doctor who said it was an allergic reaction....given her ibuprofen & benydryll....subsiding now but her skin is very dry & cracking in places... I think that this is not good...a childs face!! such tender skin...this could have damaged her skin!! who knows ...very worrying. My daughter has emailed tesco's ...sent them pictures & is awaiting a reply.