The Connection between Pollen Sensitivity and Food Allergies
We’ve had a few days of intoxicatingly warm balmy sunny days, as we officially recalibrate from winter weather into spring. The pollen count has spiked high this week, triggering many seasonal allergy sufferers with much more intense symptoms. My allergy practice has accelerated with many more new & old seasonal allergy patients coming out of the woodworks, showing up for allergy desensitizing treatments with spring pollens being thick in the air.
For some sinus or asthma sufferers, mold, dust, animal dander, smoke & airborne chemicals can also play a major role with overtaxing the immune systems for many at the end of winter, making one more susceptible to the deluge of spring pollens, once the heat gets turned up with spring sunshine & warmth. Tree pollens will propagate more once the weather gets warmer.
The first of the season tree pollens begins with a deluge of juniper & cedar pollens in the cold winter months, followed by alderwood & birch reactivity in mid-March soon followed by scotch broom pollens in April and culminating with the cottonwood & grass pollens mid-May & June. The heralding of spring warm blasts some unprepared Seattelites hard with challenging histamine reactions of congested sinuses & sneezing bouts. Air borne inhalants & spring winds are circulating a profuse amount of pollen as foreign proteins invading many allergy reactive individuals.
Common Symptoms of Histamine Production during the Pollen Season
Histamine is a natural substance liberally distributed throughout your body, especially in the lungs, sinuses, brain, and GI track mucosa. Histamines are the best known of the protective inflammatory responses released by the mast cells of your body’s tissues during adverse reaction, such as spring pollens.
Common Histamine Reactions Seasonal Allergy Sufferers Contend With
- Watery, itchy eyes
- Excess sneezing or asthma triggers
- Bouts of anxiety & agitation
- Runny nose & inflamed sinus tissues
- Frequent stuffy nose & postnasal drip
- Headaches that don’t go away/ sinus & migraine headaches
- Frequent unexplained skin rashes or hives
- Headaches that Don’t Go Away / Sinus or migraine headaches
Do You Know How to Differentiate Between Cold Symptoms & Seasonal Allergy Reactions?
| Characteristics | Cold Symptoms | Allergy Symptoms |
| Runny or stuffy Nose | White or yellow mucus | Usually clear mucus |
| Duration | 3-14 days long | Days to months’ Time of Year |
| Time of year | Usually Fall/Winter | Any time of Year |
| Sneezing | Minimally | Quite Frequent |
| Itchy Watery Eyes | Rarely | Often |
| Fever | Rarely | Never | Sore Throat | Often | Sometimes / post nasal drop |
The Link Between Seasonal Allergies & Food Sensitivities
I don’t want you to be ignorant about the influence that food allergies can play into the intensity of symptoms with pollen reactivity. The best metaphor that I can think of here is if you were carrying allergies around in a bucket. Each spring & summer, is your seasonal allergy bucket flooded over or is it trickling over? If you, the allergy patient’s bucket is empty of any other allergies during the pollen season, chances are there will be a trickle effect on your immune system. But is the allergy bucket is partially filled with food allergies, even though the bucket doesn’t overflow during the pollen free months of fall or winter, when the pollen allergies are added, the body’s immune system is likely to be flooded. Similarly, my patients with pollen sensitivities can be far more uncomfortable with respiratory symptoms if they eat certain foods they are intolerant of, when the pollen count is high.
Temper Your Diet with Common Sense
The single act of changing your diet when you are under the influence of spring pollens deluge is critical. Paying attention to multiple food sensitivities & stay away from those known food allergies, can reduce the suffering that seasonal allergy people have in the spring & summer months, when pollen counts are exceeding high. I liken it to the action of double dutch skipping. Both spheres of influence overburden an overworked immune system. Don’t ignore this connection.
Such awareness makes the difference between having a miserable pollen season and one that is merely uncomfortable. Breathing and eating are so basic to our existence that factors which affect either area can be equally detrimental to the quality of life. It is essential to question the influence of the pollen season on food allergies being more aggravated and conversely, food sensitivities affecting more intensity of symptoms to pollens.
Individuals who take a more balanced approach to a food allergy free diet and avoid excesses with familiar comfort foods like wheat, sugar or dairy can reduce their seasonal allergy symptoms. Cheating with familiar inflammatory comfort foods will cause the return of unpleasant allergic symptoms. It reinforces the need for avoiding the offending foods & makes following an allergy free diet easier to follow.
Article written by Kris Shaw, an allergy acupuncture specialist who assists many seasonal allergy sufferers be much less severe with their pollen reactions. Learn how you can be empowered during the spring pollen season with her unique allergy treatment care.
