Testing, Testing 1, 2, 3
I’m beginning to wonder if I need to change the name of this blog to The Health of Soulpower based on my recent adventures. This one though I brought on myself because I needed to know.
I have allergies and asthma. They diagnosed the asthma as a child, the allergies as an adolescent. I was retested in my mid 30s at my request because it seemed like I was sick ALL THE TIME and my asthma had popped up after a 20 year hiatus (yeah you don’t grow out of it). I believe my region of the country had a lot to do with my problems. Although I’ve complained loudly about this winter, for the most part, here in the dirty (Atlanta, GA metro area) we don’t have winters like the Northeast or Midwest (this year was a bit different). All that to say there are two things in particular that add to the allergy/asthma overall upper respiratory problems of our residents. 1)Stuff GROWS here all year long. We have trees and grasses and all types of budding flowering things here and 2)Pollution – Atlanta and it’s suburban sprawl is not real conducive to the utilization of public transit. We have transit, but not widespread and in fact, some of this transit is being cut (another story for a different blog). The weather folks here tell you in the summer time if you are in a “sensitive” group (older, chronic disease, children) to keep your butt in the house during certain hours because the smog is so terrible. I listen to them trust me.
Allergies are funny that way…
Mine show up in the usual places, eyes, nose, throat, lungs and in the last two years, overwhelmingly on my skin. When I moved to where I am now (a different county) I had crazy problems with my skin. I said maybe this municipal water system has a little extra in it that my former didn’t. I tried to blame it on the water. I said maybe it’s dyes and colors? I stopped using blue products because I have breakouts form dyes before. I stopped eating nuts for the same reason, skin reaction. But the problems just raged on. I said it’s stress, its sweat, it’s this is that. I had all manner of treatment, including standing in an ultraviolet box twice a week, then once a week for about 3 months. That helped TREMENDOUSLY. However I was still have places that continued to give me problems, most notably my hands, my face and neck. I just pressed on. Using those creams and things the derms gave me when it flared up and going back to my normal routine when it cleared. The back and forth was driving me nutty though because I’m thinking that there is still something that I am eating, drinking or using on my body that is causing this problem.
I went back to my allergist and requested some more tests. She concurred. This time I got a prick panel on my arm plus 3 patch tests for the back. The arms were for foods and praise ye the Lord the only allergy was to peanuts. The patch tests on the back were for chemicals and minerals. The bad part is that two of those patches fell off, inspite of my best taping efforts. The good news is that one patch survived and I found out that I was allergic to adhesive tape (which I used on the one survivor) and four very common chemicals found in hair and beauty products. A sense of relief came over me as well as a sense of adventure. Once I got the stat sheets on these chemicals I went home and did a scavenger hunt and guess what I found. Just about EVERYTHING I use on my hair, face and hands had these chemicals in them. Check out the photos at the bottom of the post, you probably have them in your bathroom or makeup back. <photos>
All that stuff is out of here. I’ve made three passes at product removal. This third pass included stuff I ignored plus stuff that I used to replace the other banned substances, now that one was frustrating.
Why am I sharing this?
1)You may be suffering too. What I’ve found in all of these tests and my own research is that just because you weren’t allergic to it before doesn’t mean you’re not allergic to it now. Are you having symptoms after being exposed to a food, a chemical, or being outside? Then it may be an allergy. Proceed to the allergist pronto (that’s an order). Sure you can do a lot of elimination and experimentation on your own but if you have access to healthcare, why not go and get tested. I wasted TWO YEARS going through elimination and experiments and pain and could have avoided it. Trust me, you want to avoid pain if you can. 2)Because I found out that my routine was WAY too complicated I really didn’t need all that stuff. My allergist told me something really interesting that made a lot of sense. She said in general, she didn’t see these types of allergies in men, but that they occurred overwhelmingly in women – because we slather this stuff all over us, HEAD TO TOE. What really drove it home was what one of her male counterparts said when I was first administered the tests that allergy to substances was not common and from his viewpoint, he was right – not common for MEN. So ladies and our skin pampering gentleman as well, all I’m saying is avoid getting “product” happy. If you’re using something now, that doesn’t give you problems and you’re happy with it. Stick with it. Don’t go out and try the latest, fanciest, “breakthrough” it just might break YOU.
What is all boils down to is…
Keeping it simple. In my quest to find a solution to the problem all I did was add to the problem. The body is a beautifully and wonderfully made thing. It tells you what it needs and I know for SURE that it tells you what it doesn’t. Listen to your body, give it what it needs and not more. It will surely thank you.
P.S. and the chemicals are: Quaternium-15, Diazolidinyl Urea, Formaldehyde, Isothiazolinone and all of their derivatives
A great resource to finding what products has these chemicals and their derivatives and ingredients is http://www.cosmeticsdatabase.com/
