Healing Allergies

The I in illness is isolation, and the crucial letters in wellness are we.
~ Author unknown

March is one of my favorite winter months, because it heralds the transition into spring. For others, spring brings feelings of dread in anticipation of seasonal allergies. If even looking at these flowers makes you want to sneeze, “this blog’s for you.”

You are not alone if you suffer from hay fever. Most of my clients date the onset of their allergies to their move to Davis. It was a few days before spring—St. Patrick’s Day 1990 to be exact—that I moved in while a neighbor moved out: “Allergies,” she explained.

By the following spring, I understood what she meant firsthand. That’s when I started experiencing allergic symptoms for the first time in my life. I didn’t even entertain moving, though: I also understood homeopathy firsthand. Homeopathic strengthening aborted any further attacks.

Davis appears to be a prime area for latent “sensitivities” to become active in people. Fortunately, there is diversity in the treatment options available for allergy-sufferers, and I am going to share with you some of what homeopathy has to offer.

Homeopathically, when a person has allergies, it means he or she is a sensitive person. While a particular allergen appears to be the cause, it is, in fact, the person’s sensitivity to the allergen that has led to allergy symptoms. Regardless of what substance is discovered to be an allergen, it is the person’s constitution¹ which needs to be strengthened so that he or she is less “sensitive” in general. This can best be done by professional treatment through a homeopath certified in classical homeopathy.

March is a good time to be treated “constitutionally,” before the attacks begin. The symptoms of hay fever will hardly ever reveal the indications for a remedy, and during a homeopathic consultation I inquire into any health problems which predated a person’s allergies. In this way I am able to understand a person’s constitution and thus make appropriate recommendations.

There are a handful of homeopathic remedies which can be used over-the-counter to mitigate violent symptoms of hay fever.

One of the nice discoveries about homeopathy is that you are not just making symptoms go away (although they do). At the same time your symptoms resolve, you strengthen your immune system and get sick less often with time, not more.

Here are some remedies that help the acute symptoms of allergies. If your allergies persist, you need to see a homeopath to get at the root of why you have them in the first place.

Most of the following remedies are available through health food stores and larger grocery chains (i.e., Nugget)—either in the homeopathic section or by special order. Potency is secondary to the correct remedy. Follow dosage directions on the bottle.

• Pulsatilla is useful in hay fever, especially for people with a nervous temperament. The attack comes on with sneezing and a watery discharge, and is followed by a copious, thick, yellowish-green discharge. Symptoms will be worse in the evening, the nose filling up with thick, yellowish-green, ropy mucus. Often, when the nose has been cleared, a dry, burning, smarting feeling will remain. Sleep in a warm room will be impossible, and the person will want a window open.There is a another variety of Pulsatilla hay fever which starts with a watery discharge that ends in sneezing. This type of Pulsatilla hay fever will make you think of Carbo vegetabilis, Arsenicum album, Allium cepa and Euphrasia (see below).

  I remember a Davis Food Co–op staffperson took Pulsatilla based on my description. She later shared that not only did her allergies go away, but within two weeks the remedy cured a chronic vaginal yeast infection.

   

• Natrum muriaticum hay fever symptoms will be worse in the morning until about noon. Natrum muriaticum is a little like Pulsatilla in the smarting and inability to sleep at night in a warm room. In Natrum muriaticum, too, the discharge may continue day and night.
• With Carbo vegetabilis, there is a watery discharge, and the irritation extends into the chest, with hoarseness and rawness.
• In Allium cepa, there is an excoriating (burning) discharge from the nose and a bland discharge from the eyes. In the larynx, there is a sensation as if hooks were there, and sometimes this extends below the larynx. This group of symptoms always indicates Allium cepa. Symptoms are also worse in a warm room, like Pulsatilla.

I remember in junior high my daughter, a classical Pulsatilla child, developed the pattern of catching a cold with backache and foot cramps prior to each menstrual cycle. Various remedies would help but not hold. One time her cold symptoms (i.e., what mainstream medicine calls allergies) pointed to Allium cepa. I gave one dose, and all symptoms miraculously went away—even her menstrual cramps.

• The Euphrasia hay fever looks like Allium cepa, only the discharge from the eyes is copious, watery and burning. The lachrymation (tears) burns the eyes and excoriates the cheeks. The discharge from the nose is bland, like Pulsatilla. Sometimes this goes into the chest, but then Euphrasia would no longer be indicated.
• Iodine (Iodium) is worse in a warm room. There is a thick discharge from the nose which burns, excoriates and is yellowish-green. One thing that differentiates this remedy from all the others is that the person will begin to emaciate (grow thin) when the hay fever comes on, despite being very hungry.
• Kali hydriodicum (Iodide of Potassium) has a thick, yellowish discharge which is worse in a warm room. There is a great amount of rawness and burning in the nose, and the external nose is very sensitive to pressure and will feel sore. The root of the nose also feels sensitive. The whole face aches, and the person is extremely restless. He or she will want to walk in the open air and won’t be fatigued in so doing.
• Arsenicum iodatum is indicated when there is anxiety, restlessness and weakness. The person sneezes frequently and has a copious, watery nasal discharge that burns the lip. (By the way, this is the type of hay fever for which the “cold care” tissue with lotion was created.) There is a burning, watery discharge from the eyes, like Arsenicum. The person needing Arsenicum, however, would want to be very warm and would want hot water applied to the eyes. Their greatest relief is from sniffing hot water up the nose.

When Arsenicum iodatum is indicated, comparatively, the person is worse in a warm room, and for days after sneezing the discharge thickens and becomes gluey, looking like thick, yellow honey. It is an excoriating discharge. The person will complain of much pain through the root of his or her nose and eyes, and the chest will often feel raw. The person might also feel short of breath.

• Finally, remember our old friend Nux vomica, which has free, easy breathing in the open air. When the person goes into a warm room, his or her nose stuffs up, which also occurs at night. Although the water drips on the pillow, the person stuffs up, like Pulsatilla and Arsenicum iodatum.

There’s also a class of remedies for the asthmatic form of hay fever, but these are beyond the scope of first-aid and acute care homeopathy and justify the assistance of a classical homeopath.

I called homeopathy “miraculous” above. It’s just homeopathy. When held up to mainstream medicine and even alternative treatments, though, the ease of homeopathy—in testament to Dr. Hahnemann’s “rapid, gentle, permanent” mission—is what most often elicits criticism.

There are many ways to treat allergies holistically. I’ve provided an introduction to one of the most effective, affordable, and least-invasive options.

If you have annual allergies that only occur in spring, now’s a good time for constitutional care so you can begin to break-up the pattern and, in time, free yourself.

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¹ A person’s “constitution” is the physical makeup of his or her body, including the mode of performance of its function, the activity of its metabolic processes, the manner and degree of its reactions to stimuli, and its power of resistance to the attack of disease-causing organisms.