Virginia: The Old Dominion

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Pollen worse this year? (self.virginia)

submitted 8 months ago by Frodis_Caper to c/virginia

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I have lived in Virginia since birth (a long time ago). I grew up in Hampton Roads where our porches and cars were yellow in the spring to the NRV where I started getting allergies, but nothing major.

This year, I cannot walk outside without my eyes starting to water. I take an OTC allergy med, but it's not touching whatever the hell is in the air. Anyone else experiencing worse than normal allergies rn?

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[–] takeheart 2 points 8 months ago

You can look up pollen load in weather forecasts to get an empiric answer and it's useful if you plan to spend a lot of time outside during certain days. And yes it varies from year to year.

Unfortunately global climate change generally makes it worse as plants start to blossom earlier and longer with increased temperatures.

Nevertheless keep in mind that others things affect your reaction too namely your general health state, medication, nutrition, time spent outside/inside, stress, how often and when you open your windows, wash your hair or change clothes or whether you own a pet. Whether you dry your washed clothes outside, if you're a smoker and whether you live rural or urban.

Mayhaps some factors have changed for you? During allergy season I try to adapt my behavior as much as possible.

[–] ZagamTheVile 1 points 8 months ago

Yeah. I'm in Maryland near DC and this year is brutal for pollen. This last week has been especially bad. And allergies, I think, tend to get worse as you get older. At least that's true anecdotally.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

I'm over on the Eastern Shore and I've been having a similar issue over the past few weeks. I can physically feel my eyes every moment of every day. I've always had allergies, but this is definitely a really bad year. I think the fact that we haven't seen any major storms since the trees bloomed has also been contributing to things being bad as well.