Wrexham co-owner Rob McElhenney sparks concern with New Year's Eve photo

A lot of us will have woken up with a rough head this morning, but I'll bet it didn't come close to the state of Rob McElhenney's in his New Year's Eve photo dump.

The actor, who co-owns Wrexham FC with Ryan Reynolds, sparked serious concern among fans when he shared a snap of his huge swollen head on December 31.

In the selfie, his face appeared to have ballooned in size and become disfigured - but he brushed off his bulging features that had swollen one of his eyes shut and simply dubbed it a 'slight allergic reaction'.

Even McElhenney's celeb pal and fellow comic Mindy Kaling said she had 'almost dropped her phone' after seeing the shocking image, while her young son 'screamed' at the sight.

And a lot of us lot did the same when we stumbled across the post and got the shock of our lives while scrolling through Instagram having a nosy at everyone's 2023 roundups.

Instagram/@robmcelhenney

The 46-year-old film star shared a carousel of images with fans showing his highlights of last year, which included pictures of him with his wife and It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia co-star Kaitlin Olson, a selfie with Prince Harry as well as a snap of him and Reynolds chatting to King Charles and Camilla on the pitch. As photo dumps go, it's pretty hard to top that.

But as we all know, we were all hit with a lot of ups and downs throughout the last 12 months - and it looked like life had really given McElhenney a beating.

He captioned his post: "Aside from that slight allergic reaction to the nuts, 2023 was one of the best years of my life.

"Thank you to the people and places that made it possible. My life is full of love and joy because of you. So excited for 2024. I’ll stay away from the nuts."

And social media users were obviously left stunned by his terrifying appearance and couldn't believe he had supposedly suffered such a severe reaction.

Instagram/@robmcelhenney

One said: "Holy f**k. I feel like with that reaction to nuts you probably had to be close to actually dying."

Another wrote: "That’s not real… is it? Our faces can do that???"

A third joked: "I thought there was a Goonies remake coming out!! Heyyy youuuu guyyyss!!"

A fourth added: "That first slide can’t be real…is it real?? I really impressed and/or horrified."

And a fifth commented: "Girl please tell me that’s makeup."

Well, you'll be relieved to hear that McElhenney's head did not really double in size and misshapen in real life - it was actually his iconic character Mac who suffered the dramatic allergic reaction. Take a look here:

The actor had to don prosthetics for an episode in season 16 of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, where he suffered from a severe peanut allergy but couldn't stop chomping on his value size tub of 'Extra Fancy Nuts'.

Despite his lips becoming incredibly swollen and struggling to breathe, he continues to eat his snack and insists he must of had a reaction to blowing up inflatable furniture.

By the end of the episode, his entire face has blown up - but he wants to go to Costco rather than the hospital to, you guessed it, get more nuts.

So you can stop panicking, it was just a prank - and McElhenney didn't really start 2024 off looking like Sloth from Goonies.