Allergies can certainly be seen as a curse by those that suffer from them. The allergy response is produced via the immune system in our body. The immune system is our body’s natural defence system against foreign challenges which may include bacteria, viruses, parasites, toxins and many other substances.
Our immune system is based in our blood (mostly white blood cells) and specialized tissues. When there is a foreign challenge, our body can deal with it in a number of ways often making changes in the cells that produce an inflammatory response. Inflammation is supposed to help resolve and remove the foreign challenge i.e. by the release of specialized substances including histamines that cause increased fluid retention (swelling) and circulation (redness and heat) to the site, heightening sensations such as pain and itchiness. The result of this is to stimulate the immune system to do its job in eliminating or resolving the challenge.
Certain individuals can become super sensitive to particular foreign substances causing their immune system to over react to things that are normally harmless in other individuals. This is called ‘allergy’ and often allergies produce symptoms that are disturbing. An allergy can be triggered by something contacted through the diet eg gluten or external environment eg grass pollens. There are many thousands of triggers for allergic reactions and these are called allergens. For some people, exposure to a particular allergen can produce immediate and, sometimes, life threatening reactions as observed in anaphylaxis.
Allergy can present itself with symptoms that are internal and /or external on the body. Some examples are: rashes, eczema, asthma, digestive upsets, bowel changes, swellings and overproduction body fluids as seen in symptoms like runny eyes. Individuals that are prone to hypersensitive allergy reactions have a characteristic imbalance in their white blood cells of the blood. There are many ways that our practitioners can assist in balancing white blood cell count & strengthening the immune system bringing these white blood cells towards balance and work towards improving allergy symptoms.
We aim to achieve this by:
- helping to identify and reduce exposure to the responsible allergens
- using nutrients and herbal medicines that have natural anti-histamine and anti-inflammatory properties.
- employing methods to moderate the immune system and its responses. We now have much research evidence linking the health and integrity of the digestive system with the state of the immune system.
- reducing the overall toxic / allergenic load on the body eg by implementing dietary and lifestyle ‘detox‘ protocols. See ‘detox‘.
- assessing and addressing compounding factors that can make you more susceptible to allergy including stress, diet, toxicity, lack of exercise, hormonal balance, nutrition and overweight (see ‘weight loss’).
Contact us at Des Lardner’s Organic for further professional advice on allergy management.