Allergy Times — The Daily Edition

My tree pollen allergy has been fun this month. But thankfully, tree allergies are over for now. Grass allergy season has begun, but that’s not quite as bad. I think I may have helped the Claritin stocks just a bit, or I would have, but I use a generic brand.

We do our best to remember to change our clothes when we come into the house after being outdoors during pollen season. Allergies are not easy to deal with, and there’s no way to completely avoid bringing some pollen into the house, but changing into clean clothes and taking a shower does help.

Anyone else notice that they tend to react more to tree fruit during tree allergy season? That’s cross-reactivity in action. Sometimes I experience allergic reactions to fruit, and sometimes I don’t. Depends on the season.

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Food allergy and intolerance can be major problems for many children and families. Symptoms of food allergy can appear quite early in young children, leading to the need to test for allergies or food intolerances. When it comes to your child and food allergy, however, it’s vital to be informed. If your child develops a rash after eating a given food such as peanut, egg, or sesame, for example, it’s important not to assume that the reaction will stay mild. Symptoms of food allergies can change over time, or with each subsequent reaction.

When in doubt, consider seeing a licensed allergist who can perform tests for food allergies — whether skin allergy tests or food allergy blood tests. And be sure to ask whether or not your child should carry Epipens or other medications. When it comes to your child’s health, it’s vital to speak up and ask for what you need to keep your child safe.

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Great,  just great. It seems I’m allergic to corn. I’ve always been able to tolerate it before, but I had a handful of plain tortilla chips (nothing in them but ground corn), and I had a reaction that verged on anaphylaxis — difficulty breathing and terrible abdominal symptoms. Here’s hoping this doesn’t apply to trace amounts. Corn allergy can be pretty difficult to manage, as it’s in so many products, particularly in the form of corn starch as a medication filler.

Have I mentioned that I sometimes wonder why my IgE is so wonky?

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As anyone who knows me is aware, my list of allergies is something to behold. So much so that my fantasy is to own a low-allergen home to help reduce my symptoms of allergy. I’ve read about various builders who are able to build homes with hypoallergenic materials, and install an allergen filter in the furnace area to reduce dust mite allergen reactions. As for animal allergy reactions, the filter helps when pet owners come over to visit, with animal dander on their clothes. (Being dust allergic poses problems while travelling too, but that’s for another posting!)

But since my dust mite-free dream house is pretty expensive, I’m just, well, dreaming, so I’ve had to come up with realistic ways to reduce the allergen load in our home. My allergy symptoms can be pretty severe, especially my hayfever and my mold allergy. There is no true hayfever remedy, so when the pollen count is high, I simply stay inside with the allergen filter system. For those readers who are looking for allergy filters of all kinds, I’d like to recommend these allergy filter products at The Allergy Store. You can also check out the rest of their products at their main site. I’ve been really impressed with what I’ve seen so far.

I’m also allergic to cats and dogs, and I get hives if I’m so much as licked by one of these furry animals, and antihistamines don’t always work for me. These pet allergen neutralizers are one way of coping with the problem, but obviously, you have to gauge your own level of allergic reactivity; some allergy sufferers can tolerate being around a dog for an hour or so, and this type of dander neutralizer helps to reduce symptoms even further.

In addition to taking precautions to prevent environmental allergies such as the dust allergy and dog and cat allergies, my sesame seed allergy and peanut allergy are also dangerous enough that I have to take precautions to avoid severe allergic reactions against them as well. So my approach is one of prevention, and I do several things at once to stay safe and reduce my allergic symptoms. For example, I do the following:

I call food companies to ask about their allergen labeling whenever I eat something new, and every time the packaging or ingredients change, or if the company has been bought. I also call once every year just to be sure.

1. I keep all major allergens out of the house (works for me)
2. I own and use two HEPA allergen filters
3. I wear a dust-mask when I have to be in dusty areas, or when I need to dust the house — this reduces dust mite concentrations in my nose and lungs.
4. I stay indoors during high-pollen days.
5. I carry Epipens everywhere I go.
6. I take antihistamines as I need them, but again, they don’t always work perfectly, and do nothing for me when I have a severe allergy.
7. I take annual allergy shots against ragweed pollen; I find that this works for me.

If any or all of these tips is useful to you, please let me know in the comments area.

Stay safe and healthy!

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I had some blood tests done recently at a local hospital that is not known for its allergy awareness. Other hospitals in the area eliminated latex gloves and tourniquets from their blood test centers a few years ago, but whenever I had tests done at the hospital in question, there they would be — latex gloves and a latex tourniquet. Whenever I asked for latex free alternatives, the technicians would give me funny looks or simply tell me that there were none. Usually, they would just wrap the latex tourniquet around my sleeve to avoid direct contact with my skin. On a few occasions, the techs wrapped nitrile gloves around my upper arm, which truly hurt.

So, when I walked into the hospital in question last week to have some blood drawn, I was surprised to find that the default tourniquet was non-latex, though the gloves still hadn’t changed. The technician sanitized her hands well and didn’t wear any gloves during the test. Not that this is particularly safe for her, but she told me that she doesn’t like to wear latex gloves.

We talked about all of the health care staff who had recently developed latex allergies, or whose mild reactions to latex were becoming more and more severe with each exposure. This is exactly why I avoid it when I can. My allergy is mild for now, and I’m going to try to keep it that way. I find that vinyl gloves are a good alternative when I’m cleaning the house. I can usually find them in boxes of 100 at the local drugstore.

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If you’ve linked here from the main site, at http://www.allergytimes.com, you may be wondering what this blog is about. With all of the allergy sites out there on the web and in the blogosphere, you may be inundated with information about everything from allergy testing to egg allergies. But this blog is a bit different. It’s about daily life with allergies — the good, the bad, and the ugly.

I’ve intended to put up an allergy blog for some time now, mostly because I’m asked — on a regular basis — how I manage to not only live, but thrive with severe multiple food allergies and environmental allergies. I felt it was time to simply record what I do to deal with my allergies in blog form. From preparing allergy-free meals at home to eating in restaurants (which I don’t), and having allergy tests done, I’m going to post all about life with allergies here. I hope it’s useful and interesting to you.

Ah, but what about the product reviews and ads on the site, you may ask? Is this legit? Yes. In fact, I’m a real human being with very real allergies. I carry EpiPens and use a number of different products to help me deal with my symptoms. It was my own online allergy product searches over the years that led me to decide to set up a series of online reviews and recommendation — because when I searched for information on allergy and allergy remedies, I found extremely questionable products. I also wasted a lot of money on really mediocre allergy books and treatments. So, you can rest assured that if I review it and have good things to say, it’s because I trust it. And of course, if something I write about helps your allergic symptoms, I look forward to hearing about it!

In the interest of being really clear, if you’re looking for an allergy cure, you won’t find one here. That’s because there is no cure for allergies. Yet. However, there are many things you can do to help relieve your allergy symptoms. I’ll post about the ones that work for me.

If we’re all very lucky, however, an allergy cure will be found soon, and I will happily post about it.

Have an allergy-free day!

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