huh, every time I eat a kiwi my lips get itchy. I just googled and it doesn’t look like it contains urushiol, but it does contain an allergen called “actinidin”.
This thread made me realize I’m allergic to kiwi’s…
This thread made me realize I’m allergic to kiwi’s…
Personally I have OAS with raw carrots, which is likely cross-reactive from my birch pollen allergy. Raw carrots make my throat mildly itchy, but I don't have a food allergy to carrots and I don't get anaphylaxis. Cooked carrots are totally fine, the cooking destroys the protein. This is a common feature of OAS.
Actually, while I did have OAS with carrots in the past, I have recently been undergoing immunotherapy for pollen allergies (plus cat dander and mold) and in addition to my hay fever symptoms disappearing, I no longer get the itchy throat with raw carrots.
This page has a list of common pollen allergies and the foods that they may be cross-reactive with: https://www.chop.edu/conditions-diseases/oral-allergy-syndro...
Took me 30 years to find out that I have pollen allergies, and from that food allergies.
And because my body only produces very little diamin oxidase, that leads to heavy symptoms elsewhere in the body. I just recently got so far that diet and fenistil make things usually bearable, and when it gets heavy, only a little more fenistil fixes the symptoms. I don't think the symptoms are anaphylaxes, but overabundance of histamine. I had too many of them and I'm still here, never had to use the epi pen.
But from all the specialists I visited in my country, no one ever told me, that OAS exists, or oral therapy against them.
I can't say how thankful I am for the new ideas from your post and the child posts!
If you have frequent reactions, I'd say you should really consider immunotherapy. Even if they haven't been bad enough to kill you yet, the next one can always be worse. And if you have borderline anaphylaxis, waiting to administer the epi-pen can be fatal, as it can be less effective if you wait too long. Antihistamines will not save you from anaphylaxis, as while they reduce/mask some symptoms they do not treat the specific symptoms that kill you (hypotension, and/or airway swelling leading to suffocation). Only epinephrine does that.
That symptom matches my reaction to egg whites but the weird thing is, it's only some forms. I can eat hardboiled eggs no problem (probably because the allergen has denatured), but not most other forms itch while baked goods are very hit or miss. The worst are meringues and macaroons.
My wife eats a lot of avocado being from south america and that part went away, and the latex allergy seems to have reduced as well.
Allergies are often funny, at least for me. Exposed to a single allergen usually results in no reaction. But many, many small exposures to diverse allergens adds up and can trigger a disproportionate response.
I have a friend who's food-related allergies (non-anaphylactic) disappeared after removing carpet flooring in their home.
Yeah, that's a thing. Also you may notice higher sensitivity to allergens if your immune system is fighting off a cold (perhaps even before you're aware of being sick, or even if someone in your household is sick and you don't get it because your immune system successfully fights it off). If you are doing oral immunotherapy it is sometimes recommended to reduce your dose when you are sick to avoid reactions.
I discovered it in a funny way - I was in Tokyo trying all sorts of random foods. One night after dinner, in the cab, my throat started to swell. I had a fun time getting some emergency Benadryl from a gas station late at night speaking Japanese poorly.
I had no idea what caused it.
Flash forward a few months, I was at a birthday party back in the U.S., had a slice of kiwi, and felt like I'd swallowed battery acid. Throat immediately closed up, worse than in Tokyo. Thinking back to that previous night, I realized it hadn't been some exotic food - I'd had a salad with kiwi in it.
Fun and rare allergy.
For even more fun, try being allergic to milk. I developed that allergy later in life and hoo boy has it been a humdinger.