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15 Tips to Help You Avoid Allergies
Have you ever experienced an allergy attack? If you have, then you know how unpleasant and uncomfortable it is to have irritated eyes, a runny nose, hives or itchy skin.
It’s springtime once again and allergies can ruin a perfectly beautiful spring day, especially for people suffering from hay fever or seasonal allergic rhinitis, which is triggered by pollen from trees, grass and weeds.
But What Really Causes Allergies?
An allergy occurs when a person has an abnormally high sensitivity to a normally harmless substance, causing his immune system to overreact to chemicals, food and environmental factors.
Dr. Mercola explains that traditional medicine and natural medicine view allergies very differently. According to traditional medicine, a person is allergic because he is sick or because a part of his body is malfunctioning.
On the other hand, natural medicine views allergies as a result of the patient’s chemical or allergen exposure and dietary habits. Meaning, there is something wrong with the patient’s environment, not the patient.
In order to help you understand and deal with environmental allergies, Dr. Mercola shares valuable insight from one of his mentors, Dr. Doris Rapp, a leading allergist and environmental medicine expert.
Dr. Rapp points out the difference between typical allergies and allergies caused by something in your environment. For example, if you’re exposed to an allergic chemical, the typical negative reaction will occur in a matter of seconds.
But if you’re allergic to a food, dust, mold or pollen, it could take 15 minutes to an hour, or delayed reactions between eight and 24 hours before you get sick.
Environmental Allergies
Environmental allergies can affect any part of your body and impair a number of bodily functions, including the inability to concentrate and think clearly due to fatigue, hyperactivity, the inability to sleep, joint and muscle pains, bedwetting, ear infections, and asthma.
Common environmental allergens include dust, molds, pollen, cigarette smoke, pesticides, natural gas, gasoline, perfumes, scented cleaning materials or markers, deodorants, disinfectants, synthetic carpets, chemicals in new mattresses, Aspartame and Teflon.
Also, any type of food can cause allergies, even fruits like apples and pears. Some of the biggest culprits are cow’s milk or any dairy product, sugar, wheat, eggs, preservatives and artificial colorings.
In short, you could be allergic to just about anything! These allergies could be causing a dizzying array of symptoms. The good news is that it’s actually easy to avoid these environmental allergies.
Stop polluting your body. To protect yourself from environmental toxins, Here are 15 Tips to Help You Avoid Allergies:
- Get an air purifier for your home
- Get a water purifier for both your drinking water and shower
- Don’t microwave your food or baby bottles
- Avoid food in plastic containers or wrappings
- Don’t use high heat under Teflon cookware (or better yet, don’t use any Teflon cookware at all)
- Eat organic foods and avoid genetically-modified and irradiated foods as much as possible
- Buy natural fabrics
- Use a non-synthetic mattress with 100 percent cotton sheets
- Use natural personal care products (pure soaps, non-fluoride toothpaste, natural sanitary products) and cosmetics (lipsticks, foundations, etc.)
- For your babies, use cotton diapers (if you must use disposable diapers, Tushies is better than the others)
- Use natural cleaning products
- Use natural pest control
- Run (don’t walk) away from chemical exposures (exposure to even a tiny amount of toxin for seconds can affect your body or an unborn child!)
- Always read labels on products to check if the ingredients are natural
- Look into the pros and cons of vaccination before giving your children shots
Keeping a food diary may also be helpful. List anything you’ve consumed during the day (including vitamins, chewing gum, beverages, etc.) and record the time, amount and your body’s reactions to what you’ve eaten.
Check after two weeks for any recurring pattern among frequently eaten foods and symptoms. This can be quite difficult to pinpoint if you eat a lot of processed foods because these often contain “hidden” ingredients like corn, milk, soy, wheat, yeast and artificial additives that are often problematic.
You will find that your favorite foods are usually the ones that cause you trouble. And when you add them back the second week, on an empty stomach, one at a time, one per day, you will notice what happens within an hour when you eat that food.
If you’re interested in protecting your family and improving the quality of your health, Dr. Rapp’s book, Our Toxic World: A Wake Up Call is a good read. The book would also be beneficial for those suffering from unexplained illnesses, those planning to start a family or those experiencing fertility problems.
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Tags: allergies, allergy attack, environmental allergies, natural medicine
