HEADACHE

Allergies cause fluid to build up in the sinuses, putting pressure on the nerves in the area. This can lead to a headache directly above the eyes. The pain is different for each person, and can come on suddenly or gradually.

SLEEPINESS

Fluid in the sinuses puts pressure on the brain, sometimes resulting in fatigue, says Dr. Paul Ehrlich, a pediatric allergist based in New York. Other  reasons for daytime fatigue? A lack of nighttime sleep, caused either by your congested nose which makes it difficult to breathe or a decongestant medication containing pseudoephedrine, which is a stimulant and can keep you awake. Some antihistamines have a sedative effect and can make you feel tired during the day. Finally, hay fever sufferers can become overtired from constantly fighting the body-wide reaction.

IRRITABILITY

Usually caused by that lack of sleep, irritability is an under-recognized but very real
symptom of hay fever, says Vancouver allergist Dr. Donald Stark. Another cause: times of high stress often coincide with the different allergy seasons – and the convergence of the two would make anyone grouchy. For example, students’ final exams in June are at the height of grass pollen season, and back to school in September coincides with the start of ragweed season.

Next page: Aggravated eyes, nose, ears and cheeks

Inside, mold thrives in humid areas like the shower or the basement. Outside, you’ll find it growing in shady areas where there is dampness or where vegetation is decomposing.

Mold reproduces by sending out tiny spores that float through the air, looking for a friendly environment to make a home. These spores are resilient and can survive in even the driest conditions.

When the spores do find dampness, mold is extremely fast-growing, and so plentiful that we don’t even know how many species there are.

Estimates suggest there are between 10,000 and 300,000 different kinds. And not all are bad for humans. We use mold in food production to make cheese and soy sauce. But unless you’re making your own Danish blue, you will want to banish mold from your home.

See Also:

• Find and destroy mold in the home.

Debbie Honickman, a Toronto family doctor, never had hay fever as a child. Then in her forties, she started to react to grass in the spring, and could suddenly empathize with her allergy-suffering patients.

At first she found her symptoms so difficult “I thought, I can’t stand it!” Such was Honickman’s seasonal grief that she even contemplated leaving her province the following spring – “but I love the spring here because I love birding.”

She rhymes off her symptoms: “I feel congested, I have post-nasal drip, I snore more.” Honickman knows to expect a prolonged bout with ragweed in the fall as well – then a few years ago, she also developed allergic asthma. “I actually have to use an inhaler when my symptoms get bad. I had never had asthma in my life.”

As the grass and trees begin their spring pollinating ritual, many of us suffer with Honickman. More than five million Canadians have seasonal allergic rhinitis, commonly called hay fever. In fact, Canada has one of the highest rates of both allergic rhinitis and allergic asthma in the world, and the United States ranks only slightly behind.

The numbers of North Americans living with environmental allergies has risen rapidly. With so many suddenly suffering, Allergic Living offers this comprehensive guide – examining pollen’s havoc and the most effective means of turning off the weeping, the sneezing, the congestion and the misery.

What is Hay Fever?

As with other allergies, seasonal allergic rhinitis is an immune system over-response to a protein, in this case an inhaled pollen or a mould spore. Antibodies are supposed to protect our bodies, to defend, but the immune system of a person predisposed to allergy can mistakenly identify a certain protein – perhaps birch tree pollen – as an invader and begin to create antibodies against it.

These antibodies, which are called Immunoglobulin E or IgE, attach themselves to mast cells, which are abundant in the nose, eyes, lungs and gastrointestinal tract. When the offending pollen is again encountered, the IgE antibodies grab it, triggering the mast cells to release powerful chemicals, including histamine. This causes the allergic reaction.

Allergic rhinitis is often confused with irritant or non-allergic rhinitis, which is triggered by air pollution, smoke, strong odous or medication. Some people with hay fever or allergic rhinitis find that such irritants will further aggravate their allergic symptoms.

Symptoms

In hay fever, these are the itchy, watery, puffy eyes, runny nose and sneezing that are the stuff of medication ads.

When an allergic individual is exposed to a seasonal allergen, the chemical reaction begins: blood vessels dilate in the eyes and nose, the mucous membranes secrete fluids, and the itching and sneezing start. All this discomfort leads to sleep loss, fatigue, irritability and difficulty concentrating.

Sometimes the symptoms are confused with those of a cold. But Dr. Harold Kim, an allergist based in Kitchener, Ontario, says itchiness is a prime indication that allergies are the culprit. Another clue that it’s not a virus is that you won’t get better in a week or so.

“If symptoms are due to pollens such as trees and grass, they will last over a season,” Kim says. In addition, if the sufferer has asthma, he or she may experience shortness of breath, coughing or wheezing.

Next: How to Pollen and Mold-Proof

Allergic Signs
Symptoms of an allergy to ragweed range from mild irritation of the eyes and a runny nose to completely congested sinuses; itchy eyes, mouth and throat; and sleeping problems, accompanied by fatigue and irritability.

Ragweed can provoke asthma. It is also linked to ear infections in children and sinusitis (bacterial infection of the sinuses) in adults. However, skin reactions to ragweed are rare.

The Where of It
Though there are dozens of varieties of ragweed, two are mainly responsible for the sneezing and weeping of allergic rhinitis: common ragweed (Ambrosia artemisiifolia) and giant ragweed (Ambrosia trifida).

In the United States, ragweed cuts a swath through central and eastern states from north to south. In Canada, Ontario is the hardest hit by its pollen, with Manitoba and Quebec following closely behind. In both countries, the coasts are mainly clear of it.

Weather’s Effect
Ragweed thrives during dry, hot summer weather. While most of us complain about clammy and rainy days, high humidity (over 70 per cent) makes it more difficult for the plant to release pollen.

Know the Enemy
Common Ragweed: An annual, it grows erect and as tall as 5 feet (150 cm). Lower leaf branches are opposite each other, but begin to alternate higher up the plant. The leaves are long and compound, with deeply toothed divisions on each leaf. Flowers are in spikes of small, greenish yellow florets, numerous and not showy.

Giant Ragweed: The weed lives up to its name, reaching as high as 15 feet (4.5 m). Its stems are multi-branched and hairy, with the leaves opposite, except on smaller branches.

The leaves are large, as rough as sandpaper, rounded and shallowly toothed. Flower heads are similar to common ragweed except the female head is larger. This is an annual as well, and both plants only reproduce by seed.

The Pollen: Flowers begin appearing in June, but don’t release pollen until the tail end of July, with pollen saturating the air from August through October. One plant will produce one billion pollen grains per season. Only the first frost will kill ragweed.

Next: How to Beat the Weed!

Ragweed

Of the sources of autumn allergy misery,ragweed is by far the worst. It is the most common cause of seasonal allergies at this time of year and it’s everywhere. In the one year a ragweed plant lives, it will produce as many as one billion grains of pollen that can be carried by the wind up to 650 kilometres (400 miles) away. Giant and common ragweed are found across North America (though less commonly on the coasts), with the prime blooming season running from late August until the first frost kills off these adaptable plants.

Other Weeds

Though ragweed is the worst offender, others can be problematic for the allergic:

White Cockle (Silene pratensis) – Grows up to a metre tall, with oblong leaves that are 2 to 10 cm long (1 to 4 inches) and 2 cm (1 inch) wide. White flowers open in the evenings; a prolific seed producer.

Cow Cockle (Vaccaria pyramidata) – Also known as China cockle, this weed has pretty bright pink flowers and bluish-green leaves. Height can reach 60 cm (2 feet).

Mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris) – Perennial; grows between 0.5 to 2 metres (1.5 to 6.5 feet), with a slightly hairy stem that is often reddish-brown. Leaves are dark green on top and silvery underneath; it gives off a sage-like aroma.

Curled Dock/Narrow-leaved Dock (Rumex crispus L) and Broad-leaved Dock (Rumex obtusifolius L) – Long, dark green leaves with wavy edges form a base for a metre-long stem with clusters of green flowers.

Amaranth/Pigweed (Amaranthus) – a family of annual weeds that share similar characteristics: alternating oval-shaped leaves, green flower clusters and smooth stems. Prostrate Pigweed grows along the ground while Redroot Pigweed and Green Amaranth grow upright.

Lamb’s Quarters (Chenopodium album L) – An annual with bluish-green leaves that grows up to 2.5 metres (8 feet) high on stems with purple or red blotches. Flowers are small (up to 3 mm) green petal-lesspods with a blue tinge.

Russian Thistle (Salsola kali L) – Thin, spiky leaves sprout from multiple branches that are often striped with red. Purple-tinged stems grow to more than 1 metre (about 4 feet) tall, which dry out and break off when mature, forming “tumbleweeds” that spread seeds.

Plantain (Plantago major L) – Long, narrow flower clusters (7 to 30 cm/2.5 to 11.5 inches in length) hold numerous greenish-white flowers with wind-distributed pollen. Plant grows to 60 cm (2 feet) high, with smooth, spade-shaped leaves.

Mold

Mold can be found anywhere it’s damp, including in piles of decaying plant matter, composters, gutters, rotting wood (like those porch steps you meant to fix) and inside the house in basements, bathrooms and laundry rooms. Several types of mold cause allergy symptoms, and many of them thrive both indoors and out, including Alternaria, Aspergillus, Cladosporium, Panicillium, Epicoccum, Fusarium and Bipolaris. Your allergist can test you for sensitivity to the different types, though all are hard to avoid completely.

According to the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology (AAAAI), the weather plays a large role in how badly a mold allergy will flare. The damper the conditions, the more mold there will be.

How Mould Behaves

Mould allergen is spread on the wind in the form of spores, much like the lighter plant pollens. However, unlike weeds, which are generally destroyed by the first good cold snap, many moulds simply become dormant over the winter, reappearing in the spring in soggy organic matter such as piles of mulch. During drier summer months, the mould allergic person’s symptoms wane, only to resurface in the fall with more rain and dropped leaves on the ground.

Inside, basements are a fungus’s best friend. With damp walls, leaky foundations, storage boxes full of paper, improper insulation and carpeting, the subterranean level can be the perfect breeding ground. That “musty” basement smell is a dead giveaway that mould has moved in.

Next Page: What can you do?