Spring conditions on the East Coast today. My run was horrible.
From March-May every year is miserable for me. My mind is foggy, I have no lung capacity, my body slows down. Does anybody have recommendations for spring allergies? I've tried claritin and singulair in the past. Neither seemed to make much of a difference.
Are those your only symptoms? I get a runny nose and eventually a sinus infection. I started sinus irrigation a few years ago and that helps greatly. It may not help your symptoms though.
Take your pick:
1) Move to the arctic.
2) Train indoors on a treadmill during allergy season.
3) Sack up and deal with it.
I've had very good response with this:
I also keep my mileage down in the Spring, work on cross-training, sprints,etc..
Rupp mask
1) Irrigation or 2) Zyrtec D
Alavert
Works great for me. I need it for about 3 weeks in the spring and then again in the fall.
Start to medicate before the symptoms. Since allergy is autoimmune, you can't tough it out. Run indoors on treadmill. Rinse nose and eyes regularly.
I get hay fever and for some reason don't get it when running until I stop!
Try having a shower an hour before running and breathing with your nose through something soaked in water
Failing that it's the gimp mask!
Nasacort works well for me, although, I half the dosage to avoid headaches. Saline rinses of the shnoze help too
My allergy advice is to wait a few years. Really. I felt near-death once, but it got better within a decade.
I now enjoy training almost year-round.
There's hope!
"I have no lung capacity."
Do you have asthma? I am not clear about what you mean by the above statement.
Most allergy sufferers will have nasal congestion and sneezing and watery, itchy eyes. If you are feeling problems with you lungs, perhaps you also have some element of bronchospasm.
If you are really disabled by it, should should really try and find a good physician who would be willing to work with you on it.
Claritin is a very safe, well-tolerated medication. If 10 mg daily is not working, you might try taking 10 mg twice a day. It is safe. Take it on a regular basis, every day, not just now and then.
Singulair - make sure you are taking it every single day. It is more effective if you take it at bedtime.
Long-acting nasal steroid, such as Flonase - again, use it every single day, in the amount recommended by your physician.
You might also ask your doctor to give you a trial of inhaled steroid, such as Flovent, and also a trial of an Albuterol inhaler that you can use on an 'as needed' basis 10 minutes of so prior to running.
You can try saline nasal irrigation using something like the NeilMed Sinus Rinse. If you try this, do it prior to using nasal steroids, not afterwards.
And you can also try running with a surgical mask on, and with wrap-around sunglasses, to try to decrease allergen exposure.
Lots of options. Probably nothing will totally eliminate symptoms, but they can certainly be diminished.
sf wrote:
"I have no lung capacity."
Do you have asthma? I am not clear about what you mean by the above statement.
Most allergy sufferers will have nasal congestion and sneezing and watery, itchy eyes. If you are feeling problems with you lungs, perhaps you also have some element of bronchospasm.
If you are really disabled by it, should should really try and find a good physician who would be willing to work with you on it.
Claritin is a very safe, well-tolerated medication. If 10 mg daily is not working, you might try taking 10 mg twice a day. It is safe. Take it on a regular basis, every day, not just now and then.
Singulair - make sure you are taking it every single day. It is more effective if you take it at bedtime.
Long-acting nasal steroid, such as Flonase - again, use it every single day, in the amount recommended by your physician.
You might also ask your doctor to give you a trial of inhaled steroid, such as Flovent, and also a trial of an Albuterol inhaler that you can use on an 'as needed' basis 10 minutes of so prior to running.
You can try saline nasal irrigation using something like the NeilMed Sinus Rinse. If you try this, do it prior to using nasal steroids, not afterwards.
And you can also try running with a surgical mask on, and with wrap-around sunglasses, to try to decrease allergen exposure.
Lots of options. Probably nothing will totally eliminate symptoms, but they can certainly be diminished.
Like this response. In addition, why not get the tests to find out exactly what allergens bother you? If it's pine pollen e.g. then stay out of the pine forests for the 3 weeks that it is heaviest. For me it's mold, oak and yeast. Spring and fall are real problems, but I found singulair and flonase combo alleviates a good portion of the symptoms. when I was training heavily and racing it would have been nice to have access to an inhaler, but we didn't use such things back then.
Just deal with it. It is annoying, but there isn't much that can be done. I used to visit the doctor in March to prepare for allergy season (albuterol, Advair, prednisone, etc.). None of it really helped that much.
To be honest, I'd rather deal with allergy season than winter. I can barely run when it's cold out and have really reduced my winter training to mostly cross-training; it feels like my chest is on fire. Yet just the other day temperatures were in the mid 60's and I felt amazing during the run. Anybody else have this?
Entsol nasal rinse bottle. why treat the result of spores, pollen etc. when you can simply rinse them away?
Bump - it's that time of year.
I have had problems balancing the symptoms of my allergies with the drowsiness I get from medication. Does anyone have any recommendations? I currently take Allegra, a flovent inhaler, and nasonex nasal spray.
bananas can help with allergies
Go buy a Neti pot and quit whining like a little girl.
Apple cider vinegar in diluted water with honey taken every day. Make sure the apple cider vinegar is organic, raw with the "mother" in it. Make sure the honey is local.