AaaaaaaAAAACHEW!!!
Don’t stifle it. Rear back; aim, deflect and/or cover it to minimize the fallout; and let it curl your toes. Your nose simply sensed some passing detritus it wanted to expel at 200 mph, and diverting that into your sinuses can harm them. An occasional sneeze means nothing, is far more socially acceptable than some of its competition, and feels great. Enjoy, and pretend you couldn’t stifle it!
But frequent sneezes usually mean something. If you have allergic rhinitis (AR, AKA hay fever), they often mean, “DANG! Spring is here!” And it doesn’t even have to be spring; hay fever strikes whenever whatever you’re allergic to is spewing whatever you’re allergic to.
Let me rephrase that. We’re not really allergic to whole trees, bushes, or animals. The irritant is actually microscopic bits – allergens – those sources produce. Allergens include plant pollens (the worst offenders are trees, weeds, and grasses), animal dander (microscopic bits of crud your cat or wookie sheds 24/7), the mold spores and dust mites that surround us, and other substances such as foods. Any given pollen has a favored season; your other allergens may bother you all year. Visible flowers are seldom allergy threats.
Allergens often cause nasal obstruction in children, and the obstruction can grow with the children to produce sleep problems including mouth-breathing, snoring, frequent colds and ear infections, and apnea (ultimately a serious heart health threat). Lost sleep, in turn, can lead to bed-wetting, sleepwalking, and such behavioral problems as short attention span, irritability, poor school performance, and excessive daytime sleepiness. Could early AR intervention prevent many cases of “ADD”? Could correcting your child’s breathing improve his personality, school performance, athletic ability, and/or cardiovascular health? If your kid’s breathing hassles last more than a couple of weeks, get him to a pediatric ENT specialist; children are totally dependent on us for their medical care, and allergy treatments beat Ritalin by a wide margin. A very common infancy milk allergy, untreated, could lead to decades of life-threatening asthma.
The allergies you’re allergic to irritate the mucous membranes lining your nose, sinuses, eyes, and/or throat, triggering several symptoms as our bodies try to neutralize and expel the invaders. Our eyes itch and burn, sandy granules form in the inner corners of our eyes, our nose and/or eyes may run or even gush, our throat or sinuses may hurt, our sinus and/or nasal output may run down our throats and make us cough, and we may be drowsy. Severity ranges from a PITA to disabling, and 60 million people in the U.S. alone suffer from it.
Imagine a cold (i.e., infectious rhinitis) that lasts for weeks, months, or year-round (a real cold lasts only for days). Now crank up its severity tenfold, to the point the victim can’t see, breathe well, sleep, drive safely, perform desk jobs, take final exams, taste anything, or carry enough boxes of Kleenex to last more than a couple of hours. That’s allergy season for many of us, including yours truly before medical science cured me, and some people have this all year long! We may be predisposed to AR by genes, eczema, asthma, growing up overprotected from germs, or overexposure to common allergens. In turn, AR can make us more susceptible to colds and asthma. Most victims grow into their allergies between the ages of one and 30 (it takes exposure to establish an allergy), and some outgrow their allergies by middle age. Untreated, AR can lead to a variety of chronic, maybe permanent, ear and nose problems.
AaaaaaaAAAACHEW!!!
Don’t stifle it. Rear back; aim, deflect and/or cover it to minimize the fallout; and let it curl your toes. Your nose simply sensed some passing detritus it wanted to expel at 200 mph, and diverting that into your sinuses can harm them. An occasional sneeze means nothing, is far more socially acceptable than some of its competition, and feels great. Enjoy, and pretend you couldn’t stifle it!
But frequent sneezes usually mean something. If you have allergic rhinitis (AR, AKA hay fever), they often mean, “DANG! Spring is here!” And it doesn’t even have to be spring; hay fever strikes whenever whatever you’re allergic to is spewing whatever you’re allergic to.
Let me rephrase that. We’re not really allergic to whole trees, bushes, or animals. The irritant is actually microscopic bits – allergens – those sources produce. Allergens include plant pollens (the worst offenders are trees, weeds, and grasses), animal dander (microscopic bits of crud your cat or wookie sheds 24/7), the mold spores and dust mites that surround us, and other substances such as foods. Any given pollen has a favored season; your other allergens may bother you all year. Visible flowers are seldom allergy threats.
Allergens often cause nasal obstruction in children, and the obstruction can grow with the children to produce sleep problems including mouth-breathing, snoring, frequent colds and ear infections, and apnea (ultimately a serious heart health threat). Lost sleep, in turn, can lead to bed-wetting, sleepwalking, and such behavioral problems as short attention span, irritability, poor school performance, and excessive daytime sleepiness. Could early AR intervention prevent many cases of “ADD”? Could correcting your child’s breathing improve his personality, school performance, athletic ability, and/or cardiovascular health? If your kid’s breathing hassles last more than a couple of weeks, get him to a pediatric ENT specialist; children are totally dependent on us for their medical care, and allergy treatments beat Ritalin by a wide margin. A very common infancy milk allergy, untreated, could lead to decades of life-threatening asthma.
The allergies you’re allergic to irritate the mucous membranes lining your nose, sinuses, eyes, and/or throat, triggering several symptoms as our bodies try to neutralize and expel the invaders. Our eyes itch and burn, sandy granules form in the inner corners of our eyes, our nose and/or eyes may run or even gush, our throat or sinuses may hurt, our sinus and/or nasal output may run down our throats and make us cough, and we may be drowsy. Severity ranges from a PITA to disabling, and 60 million people in the U.S. alone suffer from it.
Imagine a cold (i.e., infectious rhinitis) that lasts for weeks, months, or year-round (a real cold lasts only for days). Now crank up its severity tenfold, to the point the victim can’t see, breathe well, sleep, drive safely, perform desk jobs, take final exams, taste anything, or carry enough boxes of Kleenex to last more than a couple of hours. That’s allergy season for many of us, including yours truly before medical science cured me, and some people have this all year long! We may be predisposed to AR by genes, eczema, asthma, growing up overprotected from germs, or overexposure to common allergens. In turn, AR can make us more susceptible to colds and asthma. Most victims grow into their allergies between the ages of one and 30 (it takes exposure to establish an allergy), and some outgrow their allergies by middle age. Untreated, AR can lead to a variety of chronic, maybe permanent, ear and nose problems.