Chile! It is soooo beautiful (and pollen free, you'd love it!)... although quite polluted in Santiago and raining right now! (not that different from UK I bet )
Chile! It is soooo beautiful (and pollen free, you'd love it!)... although quite polluted in Santiago and raining right now! (not that different from UK I bet )
Hayfever has landed here too. I'm using a combination of luffa drops and euphrasia drops. I find that they're actually quite good, unless the pollen count is particularly high and then the symptoms do tend to come through. Sleeping is not great either. Waking up with a face like a nostril is not fun.
No sense being pessimistic. It wouldn't work anyway.
hayfever makes me very very sick and every year it gets worse. so far i have tried conventionl drug treatment (loratadine and cetrizine tablets) eye drops, nasal decongestants, steroids, herbal rememdies, honey therapy (pre-vegan days), acclimatization therapy, acupressure, positive thinking (i'm very,very poor at this), and probaly other things. this year 3 months of snivelling hangover hell so far i've given in and bought beconase. two days later i feel like a normal healthy person again. great, except i am desperate for a long term cure or at least sympotamic relief that isn't tested on animals.
th eonly thing that helps moderately is drinking valerian tea to get a good night's sleep. (except tonight it doesn't seem to work - i'm still wired!)
It is getting difficult for a lot of people Agatha.
I wonder why I had hay fever bad for 10 years, nothing for maybe 6-7 years -and then this intense itching in my eyes.
Even though I've had it bad on occassions this year, I was determined to beat it this year by starting preventative treatment in early May.
Who knows - it could have been a lot worse.
Glad you got something to work. Is it an anti-histamine?
I Think, Therefore I Am A Vegan
its a steroid not sure if its also anti-histamine and i've thrown out the packet. it orks better than anything else i've ever tried but i still feel pretty rotten - like having a massive hangover all the time.
i really want to see an immunologist to try and treat the route problem and not just the symptons each time. has anyone ever tried that?
my hay fever is horrible today. i woke up with my throat on fire, i can't stop sneezing and i feel awful. i gave in and tried a conventional remedy, but that hasn't worked.
glad the Beconase works for you Agatha, it just makes my sinuses sting like mad and gives me nosebleeds. i've never been to an immunologist - sounds expensive?
I have to shamefully admit to have tried non vegetarian stuff this year... with the added complication that it has worked quite well too I feel a bit sick thinking about it... but also glad i have stopped crying, sneezing and feeling generally crap...
^ What worked for you?
I Think, Therefore I Am A Vegan
Benadryl (the one in the blue box with non vegetarian capsules... and lactose)... makes me sleep 9 hours a day (which is lots by my standards) but feel amazing while I am drugged with it... apart from the guilt trip!
^ It might be worth finding out what type of drug it is e.g. anti-histamine etc.
If you can find out a few details maybe your local herbalist could make you something up.
Might be worth a try.
I Think, Therefore I Am A Vegan
It is acrivastine... I tried looking for it in a different type of capsule and minus lactose but there seems to be nothing...
I am not sure a herbalist would be able to make a similar concoction... I have tried virtually everything (including mixing different types of antihistamines...) Nothing has worked like these pills...
I will do some more research... I hate taking them (but love the effects!)... Off to Scotland tomorrow so hopefully hay fever season is not happening there!
Mine has just started this week. I find Benadryl children's syrup (no lactose or gelatine) works brilliantly on me. It's Cetirizine based, have you tried that, Manzana?
Well......................a men only cure for hayfever!
Or an excuse!
http://www.newscientist.com/article/...f-for-men.html
Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty!
Well, here we go again...
Hayfever kicked in bigtime over the last two weeks. I had to buy antihistamines that are full of lactose and god-knows what else. I just couldn't deal with how itchy my eyes were, I couldn't even complete the simplest of tasks because my eyes were so swollen I could barely see. The non-vegan tablets work really well but I absolutely HATE using them.
Todays empires, tomorrows ashes...
I know how you feel. My hayfever has been really bad for the past week. Felt like I had a heavy cold and had a couple of nose bleeds Had to give into the anti histamines in the end
Mometasone furoate works brilliantly. It's prescription only though.
Got some bad hayfever today - the worst so far this year. Runny nose, itchy throat but not eyes. I used to take all kinds of pills, nose sprays and even tried the red light thing you poke up your nose. Gonna try some of the various suggestions in this thread asap
dandelions
nettle tea
local flowers
quercetin
pineapple, apple, onions, garlic, mint,
I'm already low salt & eat rice for lunch. Don't know about low fruit and how that helps but I'd willing to give it a try if all else fails
How is everybody else doing so far this year? I was really hoping I just would not get it after being vegan for 8months but I guess I'm not that lucky.
P.S. Anybody try gluten free and find that solved it?
"I dream of painting and then I paint my dream"
Vincent Van Gogh
Ok it seems to be improving since I went almost gluten & nut free (just got to cut out the oats or buy gluten free ones - been having occassional nakd nut snack bar like once every two weeks) and low fruit (was eating 8 bananas a day, sometimes 11 now down to 4). Went steamed veg, leafy greens, dandylions & berrys instead and it seems to be no where near as bad - just runny nose but not ichy eyes or throat. Weather has been fairly wet and windy though so I'm curious to know what its like when we finally get some sunshine but even on the humid days before I went vegan it would kick off.
23 July update - think I might be allergic to wheat (update tested neg for celiac - 12 11 12) as my hayfever is a lot better now after giving it up. Cutting down on fruit doesn't seem to make much of a difference. I'm guessing it was the gluten.
26 July update - Really humid cloudy high pollen day today. I walked outside for a good 2hours midday, past fields being cut, gardens that had been mowed and did not sneeze once, which was just an awesome feeling. Giving up bread definitely made a massive difference (today I ate porridge with rice milk, blueberrys, raspberrys, plus 3 banana, flax seed & spinach smoothie. Lunch was 5 bananas, nakd snack bar, water to drink, dinner rice & beans basic). Also hardly any oils, caffeine or other stimulants, refined sugar & just processed/refined foods in general these past 2months. Just a trying to switch to a very basic John McDougall starch based diet but I got to go easy on the fruit.
06 August update - Still going strong with little to no hayfever at all. This has probably been the most hayfever free summer of my life. I'm so glad I can finally enjoy going outside in the sun and not turn into a human sneeze factory. Daily food update = porridge cooked with small amount of rice milk, water in morning plus fruit. Lunch = lots of rice with beans (go easy on the beans you don't need that many) & vegetables or cold potatoes with salad & oil free sauce or salsa. Dinner = lots of baked potatoes again with steamed veg, few beans & sauce. There is still some gluten in my oats but thats about it. For snacks I eat fruit. I've been running quite a lot recently too so that might have helped clear out all the unwantables from my lungs. It's difficult at first to switch to eating so many potatoes and rice but once you adjust to eating enough starch fuel it feels so much easier.
9 August update - Got a little bit of hayfever this afternoon but no where near as bad as used to be. Lasted about an hour.
14 August - Really hot day today and no hayfever. I've been eating cold baked potatoes with salad/oil free hummus for lunch and potatoes again with veg for dinner.
20 August - I've been doing some labouring on a building site this past week and been bombarded with quite a lot of dust but still my hayfever seems not to come back except for the occasional sneeze. Today I had to eat
breakfast : brown rice with <tinned tomatoes, zuccini, onion, 3 mushrooms, red pointed pepper, kale> = made this night before and heated up this morning quickly
snack: 400grams cold baked potatoes with home made oil free hummus <tin chick peas, water, tahini, lemon, pepper, black pepper>
lunch: 120 grams of over night oats with cherrys, blueberrys, raisins, cinnamon, rice milk & water
snack: 80 grams of same over night oats
dinner: same as breakfast as much as I can eat. Through out the day I probably ate about 2kg of this rice & veg concoction.
snack: pear & plum
water to drink all day (no refined sugar to my knowledge)
http://www.drmcdougall.com/index.html
12 11 12 update - in conclusion I believe my very low gluten, low refined & processed carb/sugar (e.g. bread), very low whole nuts & oils (probably 6grams of saturated fat from oil a day or less), low fat (10% fat or less) whole foods plant based diet, plus running, sunshine & good sleep with plenty of satisfying starch calories greatly reduced my hayfever to a more manageable level. Granted this year was not exactly sunny but on the days there was high pollen I did not get it hardly at all overall, which is fantastic. If I can do it so can you.
Last edited by markusaurelius; Nov 12th, 2012 at 08:55 PM.
"I dream of painting and then I paint my dream"
Vincent Van Gogh
I've been using one of these for years: http://www.lloydspharmacy.com/en/allergy-reliever-15677
Used consistently it makes a massive difference, though I've still had a few bad days this week which is why I came here, looking for additional things to try. I say additional, but all this time I've been telling myself this thing is probably not tested on animals, but I actually don't know that for a fact, and as I've not seen it mentioned on this thread (admittedly I haven't read all of it), I'm now wondering. Purely from an effectiveness point of view, I would recommend it, though if it turns out to be animal-tested, as a last resort.
I use the nose machine as well and I find it works for me. The last couple of weeks have been really bad for hayfever as lots of plants have flowered together because of the bad weather. I think it's less likely to have been tested on animals than other hayfever treatments. My hayfever has been so awful in the past that without some form of treatment, I wouldn't be able to work. So I feel this is one of the best alternatives.
Hello everyone,
I've suffered from hay fever almost all my life. A few years ago I went raw for a couple of months and that season was hay fever free for me. I've also heard from a couple of people that you can get rid of your allergies (hay fever and ...) by going on a raw diet. Has anyone had a similar experience?
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