The Allergist

I was diagnosed with asthma when I was 16 when I started complaining of reduced lung capacity when I picked up swimming again my sophomore year of high school. I was also put on a slew of allergy meds, none of which I understood the purpose. I dutifully took my medications for several years, and when it became too much of a hassle to keep up with prescriptions in college, I got the okay from my family doctor to start taking the readily available OTC Claritin. I did, but at this point was living in a different state with much different allergens.

When I went back to Oklahoma for grad school, the first spring was a nightmare. I literally was taking everything under the sun to stop the sneezing, itchy eyes, sinus congestion, and sore throats. After several weeks, it subsided (I'm sure mostly due to the season, not my attempts to "fix" myself). Then last year, here in Dallas, the allergies returned in full fury. This time, my eyes were strongly affected. For months I walked about with ghastly red eyes (my cousin and I dubbed them my demon eyes) and made my mother worry every time I saw her. Figuring out it was allergies, I picked up an OTC allergy eye drop and that seemed to help. Then the season changed and I was fine again.

This year, it started back up again, much to my disdain. This time, it was much worse. One day, at the client, the client and my colleague were laughing at me because I couldn't breathe. I was miserable. I attempted to address the issue with a variety of OTC drugs, and honestly it wasn't even making a dent in my symptoms. I made an appointment with an allergist. I got put back on some old drugs from high school (who knew they were working? I didn't even know they were helping major symptoms). I'm back on some mild asthma meds, and learned how Singulair addresses symptoms that an antihistamine like Claritin, Zyrtec, or Allegra don't. I'm not congested anymore, I didn't sneeze once today at work, and have had a huge increase in energy.

So, when you don't feel well, you really should try going to the doctor instead of self-diagnosing and self-medicating.