Tuesday, March 17, 2009

mystery solved

I've been sick for a week now and though I'm finally feeling a little better, it's been a mystery as to why neither Fry nor Stéph have caught my disease. Stéph finally figured it out - he heard at work yesterday that we had a really bad pollen explosion last weekend and I'm certainly having an allergy attack.

Now, if you knew me in my previous life, you're probably thinking, "well, duh." It's true that I had an incredible allergy problem when I lived in Greenville, and no wonder, since it was ranked the 13th US Allergy Capital the year before I moved here. It sounds hard to believe, but my allergies were so bad that I had to take allergy medication every day and if I didn't, I had the beginnings of a sinus infection that evening. For real.

I was so used to being sick all the time that when my cache of allergy meds ran out a few months after moving here, I panicked. I was still sick a lot that first year, no doubt thanks to Stéph bringing every new virus under the sun home to me from school, but then I woke up one day and realized my allergy nightmare was over.

Now it's been three years since I've been off the meds and oh, how quickly we forget. The first signs of Spring, the warmer weather, the sun coming out, of course it's allergies! So I'll be stopping in to the pharmacy today, but this time for allergy meds instead of more cold medicine.

4 comments:

Mia said...

Allergies can e a mystery illness!!! And when you haven't had an problems for a few years you forget. Get back on the meds and stay on them. This winter was wet and will probably mean a bad allergy season for you. Get better!!!!

Suz said...

I have horrible allergies in Greenville too! Somehow, they're virtually nonexistent in Charleston and no big deal in Columbia. Not sure what grows up there that also grows here just a little, and in Charleston, not at all! Mysterious!

Have you tried the neti pot? That would probably be a good addition to your meds. I'm in love with mine.

Anonymous said...

I have fallen ill like you are describing when visiting family and friends in Texas and California. It turned out to be cedar pollen making me sick. Do you have cedar there? I live in NY state so I was unaware of cedar pollen being such a problem until I got sick a few times. I won't visit my sister in Texas unless I know it isn't cedar pollen season!

Kate Chaux said...

The first time I ever suffered from allergies was when I visited Paris in the spring. It took my completely by surprise, I just thought I was sick. Now that I'm a bit older, I seem to get the same thing every spring, the second the flowers start to poke their heads up through the ground. I find an over-the-counter allergy pill once a day for a few days solves the trick. Hope you're feeling better!