FYI: Unlikely allergies

[wolfie]

IWhen I was younger I had a nickel allergy - the skin under my watch would blister and I had contact dermatitus half way up to my elbow for years. Painting the back of my watch with clear nail polish helped and sometimes I'd use medical tape for a longer lasting cover. I now wear watches with stainless steel backs.

I'd be cautious about stainless - the 2 main alloying ingredients are chromium and nickel.

My weird allergy is to the adhesive for bandages. Any brand any backing material, I will have a bright red raised itchy patch on my skin for at least as long as I have had the bandage on after I take it off.

Have you tried bandages labeled as "latex-free", and ones which aren't labeled as such? The standard adhesive for bandages used to be latex-based, so you could have a latex allergy (or an allergy to the replacement for latex).

[Arcus]

I did the pin-prick allergy test once. They started on my arm and found that I was allergic to nothing. I did have a minor reaction to Histamine. The doctor said that a Histamine reaction meant that I was allergic to something so they brought out the full test. After covering my back with pin-pricks they found that I wasn't allergic to anything they were able to test for. They sent me away with "Whatever you are allergic to doesn't seem to be too bad so you should be okay."

[Chromatix]

Personally, I'm lucky - I don't think I'm actually allergic to anything. There are a couple of things I can't *digest*, and I'm incredibly sensitive to capsaicin (which made a business trip to Korea fairly trying), but that's nowhere near the same level of seriousness.

[AccountingDrone]

I just had an annoying afternoon. Went to the casino for lunch with Rob and our friend and hit the buffet. He is really good about getting stuff for me, asking after ingredients I am allergic to and they swore up down and sidewise that there was absolutely no coconut/tropical/palm products in the chocolate pannacotta I picked for dessert [and supposedly asked in the kitchen to make sure] and sure enough, off to the bathroom I go for some quality time with my colon. *sigh* If it exits immediately without a voluntarily taken laxative or enema is it still bulimia?

[Seshat]

Only if you deliberately selected an item with laxative-to-you ingredients. :wry: