Same Old, Same Old

Holiday aside, it's a typical last week of May. It has been pretty much fully summer for a week or two, although our pattern of afternoon thunderstorms much of the week hasn't developed yet. A couple of days ago, the National Weather Service forecast site for central Florida posted warnings of heat indices to around 105 or more but it didn't seem to materialize. This afternoon, the nearby Melbourne airport said it was 93 with a "feels like" temperature of 102. I tend to dismiss those, thinking that's what 93 feels like here, but those warnings seem most appropriate for people visiting or spending their first summer here. 

Gee summer already? Only four months left to late September.

The same day as the heat warnings, the Weather Underground posted this UV warning. I want to direct your attention to the text at the bottom. I didn't select the skin type, that's the way it was displayed by default so I didn't think to see if it said something different for other colors.

This is the UV warning I generally refer to as "Fatal within 15 minutes" but it really says 18 minutes. No more than 8 to 18 minutes exposure to the sun? Is that total sun for a full day or 8 -18 minutes at a time? Doesn't seem like it could be the second one because then they should instruct us about how many 18 minute exposures we can get and how long we need to hide inside between them.

A regular part of my life since about the time I turned 17 has been inhalant allergies. I was in high school and I'm pretty sure I remember seeing my parents' doctor in the fall of my senior year.  He prescribed an antihistamine called Teldrin, which was good for 12 hours and helped me through the allergies, which tended to be all day things when the grass fields by our house or everglades were burning. By the time I was in my mid-20s and working for a living, I decided to see an allergist. 

If you've never gone through this exorbitant ritual, the "gold standard" treatment is they first find out what you're allergic to, and then desensitize you to it with a series of injections. The test is done by injecting a tiny amount of the allergen under your skin and judging your degree of sensitivity by how big of a welt you get. 

I'll never forget this. I was tested for 60 different allergens - 60 different pin prick shots - and I was allergic to all 60. On a scale of 1 to 4 ++, I only scored less less than 3 on two things: newsprint and "common skin bacteria." My usual summary is "I'm allergic to everything that is now, or once was, alive."

I'll cut the story short and not give thousands of details, but in the 53 years since I first saw that doctor when I was 17, I've had four allergists, had the 60 (or 120) injections test done at each of those doctors, had a nose surgery that one quack, um, doctor swore by and did nothing I could tell, I've been put on the latest, most modern, "non-drowsy" antihistamines that last 24 hours, more eye drops for (maddeningly itchy eyes), glucocorticoid nose sprays and every modern alternative.  

53 years later, I still get maddeningly itchy eyes, runny nose, sneezing and everything else. I've switched from prescription antihistamines - that have gone to being nonprescription - to an old four hour OTC drug called chlorpheniramine maleate, which happens to be the exact same drug as the Teldrin I was taking 53 years ago; it's just that Teldrin was designed to be slow release so it lasted 12 hours. Do I have allergy problems less often? I don't know how to know that. In the last week, I've taken the antihistamine tablets a few times, not continually, but I live in a different part of the state and I'm sure there are different plants and allergens here. 53 years of the state of the art care and taking exactly what I took at the start. The only progress is that it doesn't require a prescription and is a penny or two per pill.