Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Allergy shots are for real, kids!

For about four months now, I've been making a twice-weekly trek to my (new) allergist's office to receive four shots (two in each arm) of special made-for-me allergy serums that contain tiny (but increasing) doses of all the environmental things I'm allergic to.

The idea is that by s....l....o....w....l....y increasing the dosage, we can train my body not to freakthefuckout when it encounters a bit of pollen, a dust mite, or a mosquito bite.

Today I reached what is called my maintenance dose--a dosage level of allergy serum I'll continue to receive every 3-4 weeks for several more years or maybe forever.

This allergy shot journey has been a huge time commitment--though the shots themselves take no more than 2 minutes, there's travel time to and from the office, waiting room time, and then you have to wait there 20-30 minutes after each shot to make sure you won't have a serious reaction. Not to mention countless hours spent at home laying on ice packs to combat the local swelling I often get after a shot.

Back of the envelope math--I've had something like 112 individual shots and spent somewhere around 40-50 hours in various shot-related activities.

But it all paid off this weekend when I spent several hours cleaning my house (sweeping, dusting, raking, etc.) with the windows wide open all while landscapers outside stirred up a veritable cloud of grass, tree, and weed pollens. For pre-shot me, this would have been a nightmare scenario--itchy eyes, hives, sneezing, etc. I might have lasted half an hour before I knocked myself out with a few benadryl and called it a day. But post-shot me had barely a sniffle, and that's without any antihistamines at all. It was like being a normal person. Truly a huge difference in less than four months.

One other note - yes, I did eventually become the mayor of the allergist's office on FourSquare, which led to a really awesome moment when the former mayor recognized me in the office and came up to congratulate me on my progress and tell me what a great difference the shots have made for him--a refrain I've heard from almost everyone who has gone through this process.

Off to lay down on some ice packs (for the last time before a 3-week break!)