J
janewhite1
Guest
Longish and boringish update, mostly good.
With the doctor's blessing, I've been exercising in a pollen free environment the past few days, mostly ice skating at our local rink, and I've had little or no chest discomfort while doing it. Really, it felt fantastic, both physically, getting my stiff muscles going, and emotionally, feeling capable again, knowing that every time I push my lungs without setting them off they're getting stronger. I've never appreciated exercise quite this much before!
So when I'm away from pollen I feel fine, but any significant time spent outside causes my chest to tighten up again, and I hate that. In fact, Saturday's one hour outside turned into feeling lousy the rest of the day, even after using the inhaler. There are so many fun social events and outdoor sports that I want to participate in, and being as I don't own a car, the outdoors is a major part of my day to day life, and I'm really feeling the lack of it.
The asthma started right at the peak of tree pollen season, after a few days of other allergy symptoms. Right now, tree pollen is winding down and grass pollen is winding up.
When the allergist did my skin tests the other day, the tree pollen wheals were modest, mosquito-bite type things, about the same size as the positive control bump. The grass pollen wheals were half an inch to an inch across, irregularly shaped, and turned most of my forearm red. Which probably means I'm more allergic to grass than I am to trees! Which does not bode well for the next few weeks.
I just found out that Zyrtec is closely related to hydroxyzine, which worked well for me in the past, so I'm now going to switch from Claritin to that, having finally admitted that popping Claritin is about as useful as popping M&M's when it comes to my allergies.
I'm still thinking about allergy shots. I'm taking expensive drugs with bothersome side effects, I'm having all kinRAB of problems with gastritis and reflux for the first time in a long time, and I'm still missing out on spring. I do not want to go through this again. Ever. I know the allergy shots may not eliminate the allergy entirely, but if I could just decrease the severity, that would be worth a lot.
Well, I'm not going to the doctor again until the middle of next month. At that point, I should have a better sense of how things are going.
With the doctor's blessing, I've been exercising in a pollen free environment the past few days, mostly ice skating at our local rink, and I've had little or no chest discomfort while doing it. Really, it felt fantastic, both physically, getting my stiff muscles going, and emotionally, feeling capable again, knowing that every time I push my lungs without setting them off they're getting stronger. I've never appreciated exercise quite this much before!
So when I'm away from pollen I feel fine, but any significant time spent outside causes my chest to tighten up again, and I hate that. In fact, Saturday's one hour outside turned into feeling lousy the rest of the day, even after using the inhaler. There are so many fun social events and outdoor sports that I want to participate in, and being as I don't own a car, the outdoors is a major part of my day to day life, and I'm really feeling the lack of it.
The asthma started right at the peak of tree pollen season, after a few days of other allergy symptoms. Right now, tree pollen is winding down and grass pollen is winding up.
When the allergist did my skin tests the other day, the tree pollen wheals were modest, mosquito-bite type things, about the same size as the positive control bump. The grass pollen wheals were half an inch to an inch across, irregularly shaped, and turned most of my forearm red. Which probably means I'm more allergic to grass than I am to trees! Which does not bode well for the next few weeks.
I just found out that Zyrtec is closely related to hydroxyzine, which worked well for me in the past, so I'm now going to switch from Claritin to that, having finally admitted that popping Claritin is about as useful as popping M&M's when it comes to my allergies.
I'm still thinking about allergy shots. I'm taking expensive drugs with bothersome side effects, I'm having all kinRAB of problems with gastritis and reflux for the first time in a long time, and I'm still missing out on spring. I do not want to go through this again. Ever. I know the allergy shots may not eliminate the allergy entirely, but if I could just decrease the severity, that would be worth a lot.
Well, I'm not going to the doctor again until the middle of next month. At that point, I should have a better sense of how things are going.