Common Animal Allergy Symptoms

Still unsure if you’re allergic to animals? Take a look at what sort of symptoms might occur if you come in contact with an animal that your immune system isn’t very happy to meet.

How you produce allergy symptoms

One of your immune system’s role is to fight against viruses and bacteria that enter your body, protecting you from getting sick. Instead, those of you who have allergies have immune systems that use their defenses to attack foreign invaders that are harmless such as animal hair, dander and saliva. This is called a hypersensitive immune reaction which involves IgE antibodies (defenders of your body) to fight against these harmless invaders that have entered.

When your body produces these antibodies, they then get ready to fight by releasing weapons to destroy the foreign invaders immediately. These weapons are chemicals called histamine, cytokines and leukotrienes whom are responsible for producing all of the symptoms that occur when you come in contact with animals.

Symptoms:

Urticaria: Hives or itchy welts
Puffy, red, itchy, watery eyes
Sneezing and coughing
Asthma: Shortness of breath or wheezing
Rhinitis: Stuffy nose, itchy nose, nasal discharge, itchy ears, itchy palate (roof of mouth)

Steps to reduce your allergic reactions to animals

Just doing these few steps can bring instant relief to those horrible symptoms.

Frequent vacuuming of the floors and furniture
Try not to let the pets inside the house too often
Keep the pet well groomed and bathed weekly (get someone else to do this!)
Close air vents when the pet is inside the house, as they can circulate the animal hair and dander around the house that you could react to later
Keep your skin covered when playing with animals, so that the saliva and hair don’t come in contact with your skin avoiding that beautiful rash

Beginning these steps to really reduce your exposure to animals, while still being able to keep your beloved pet will make your life much brighter. However it won’t completely relieve your symptoms. You can look into medications or natural relief treatments that will really help you with the symptoms when they hit. There are also allergy products that have been especially designed to help people just like you.