Allergies

[Miko]

I'm having a terrible day with allergies and was curious if anyone suffers from any type of allergies. Be it seasonal, food or drug allergies, etc. - Do you suffer from them? How bad?



Today I am extremely dizzy and a bit nauseous. I usually I get hay fever in the fall season but apparently this spring/summer time is trying to kick me in the boot. Usually it's just the usual runny nose and stuffy eyes but this particular day it's been a lot of drainage & an itchy throat.

I don't have any food allergies thankfully, but I am allergic to a lot of things that come into contact with my skin. I've used the same shampoo for years because so far it's the only thing that doesn't make my scalp catch on fire. I once tried switching my body-wash by applying a small amount to my arm once a day for a week. After deeming it safe I began using it regularly before my arm broke out severely! It looked like I was part of a bug repellent commercial where they stick an arm into a mosquito box during the 'before' segment. Usually I have an immediate reaction, like when kids in the locker room would mask their stench with perfume and my skin would start to get itchy just by being in the same room, but it's hit & miss on some products.

I'd be curious to take one of those allergen tests where they prick a spot on your skin & wait for welts to form, but that seems terribly itchy!

Anyway, if you have anything worth posting about, let us know if you have any allergies and how it affects your daily life. I can't imagine how difficult it must be for some people who have to be very strict about what they consume in their diet!

 

[Belazor et Britannia]

(Relatively) Mild pollen / dust allergy here. Thankfully Tesco near me have a very weird sale going on; one pack of antihistamines cost £6.20, but it's on offer at 2 for £6. So they essentially give you a refund of 20p if you remove more of their stock. I'm still waiting for someone to explain the logic behind that, it's not like they're expiring soon either.

Anyway.

It sucks because summer is a magical time, for entirely crop top related reasons, and yet on especially pollen-rich days I walk around like I've got the flu and I'm being an inconsiderate shitebag trying to infect everyone. It's just the pollen, swer on me mum

 

[Six]

(Relatively) Mild pollen / dust allergy here. Thankfully Tesco near me have a very weird sale going on; one pack of antihistamines cost £6.20, but it's on offer at 2 for £6. So they essentially give you a refund of 20p if you remove more of their stock. I'm still waiting for someone to explain the logic behind that, it's not like they're expiring soon either.

Shameless Tesco promotion plug, dang. Use the promo code #DontAtMeFilly for 0% off.

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No allergies on my end as far as I'm aware, thankfully! I see people who do get struck by the pollen plague and I can't say I can relate!

 

[charmy]

I have a few allergies that can sometimes cause me a bit of grief. But I found out about most of them when I was really young.

The main one is that I'm allergic to wheat. Found out about this one early on when my mum introduced me to cereals as a kid, but I had to wait to be a certain age to get the skin prick test done (wheat flared up a lot!). When I was older they also tested to see if I had coeliac, but that was not the case. My mum never took wheat out of my diet completely so I can tolerate certain things (like white breads) up to a certain point (I'll know when I've eaten too much). But wholegrain or anything that has a high wheat content will cause me trouble.

The only other thing that came up in the skin prick allergy test was mold. Which might explain why I am also allergic to penicillin. I can't take any antibiotics that are penicillin-based. Thankfully there are a lot of alternative options so it doesn't affect me too much.

 

[Dionysos]

I'm mildly allergic to crisps in that I can come out with a red rash or blotches if I eat them, but nothing life threatening.

I love them so as a kid I used to have some on sneaky occasions and then it would be obvious that I had so I could never get away with it. Now I have some every now and then as the reaction seems to be less severe and I just put eczema cream on if it gets bad. I avoid them most of the time.

Interestingly, my mild allergy translated itself into a recurring nightmare figure in the form of 'The Crisp Spider'. When I was a child I used to have dreams of a large arachnid made entirely out of ready salted crisps. It used to crunch as it walked and bits of crisp would snap or crumble off as it moved. In the Crisp Spider's defence, he never did me any harm. He had rather cute eyes and expressive eyebrows. Maybe he just wanted to say hello?

I drew a picture of him for a drawing prompts challenge on FFF, so here is an approximation of what he looked like:

Spoiler: Click if you don't mind seeing a sketch of a spider.