Heavy Artillery for Allergy Season

Spring is here!

This free, non-paywalled edition of HEAVIES is once again brought to you by CAVA, one of the few bowl places I genuinely LOVE. The thing I appreciate about CAVA is it always hits—particularly the Spicy Lamb + Avocado, which I get with rice instead of lentils. To my mind there's no better way to hit my macros.

I don’t know what it is, but in 2013, after a lifetime of not experiencing any kind of seasonal allergies, I suddenly found myself getting walloped: red, watery eyes; wheezy mouth breathing; SNOT. I was going through a small forest’s worth of tissues every week. I started taking Zyrtec—the only thing that worked—every morning. Failure to do so rendered me completely debilitated, saddled with brain fog and unable to blog at my day job. (I suspect part of this is because, being Filipino, New York City’s abundance of pollen-belching male trees were an unfamiliar adversary for my Jungle Asian immune system.)

Over the past decade-plus I’ve gotten a little better at managing my allergy symptoms. (One of the big ones, I’ve learned, is to not rub your eyes, ever—and to wash them out multiple times a day.) I’ve tried everything, every neti pot, saline spray, eye drop, little electric zapper thing, everything short of actually going to the allergist and getting pricked with needles, which I’m not actually opposed to. Exposure therapy is so time consuming!

Here’s the stuff that’s really been working for me lately and has my nasal passages feeling clean and well-ventilated and able to breathe, which is important if you are a functioning human who would like to participate in the world.

(And please note that buying through one of the affiliate links may earn me a small commission etc etc.)

Navage Nasal Irrigator

Pictured above. I purchased this thing out of desperation, and HOLY SHIT is it amazing. The thing that separates it from other irrigators is that as one side hoses you down with saline, the other nozzle possesses VACUUM SUCTION, so all nastiness therein gets deposited in the basin at the bottom. I find using it to be satisfying in the same way that using a Biore pore strip was once satisfying: you get to see all the gross shit excreted by your body lol.

Less cool: You’re supposed to use these proprietary saline capsules in order to use the machine (it includes 30), but, truthfully, this is really easy to hack and I’ve been using regular saline packets no problem.

Allermi Nose Spray

I started getting targeted ads for this nose spray on Instagram a few months ago, and I pulled the trigger in January.

It works well—a little too well. 100x better than Flonase or anything like that. How the process works is essentially you fill out a little survey on the site, and then some disembodied doctor on the other end writes you a customized prescription depending on your symptoms.

It’s about $60 for a bottle, and since I’m a cheapskate, I only use it on extra bad days. But it opens up my nasal passages almost immediately and the rush of oxygen gives my brain wings.

Bootleg Zyrtec

I desperately do not want to have to take this stuff every day, but short of getting longterm allergy treatments I don’t know what the alternative is. I buy this generic version since it’s way more affordable.

These three things have been working for me and I rarely have days where I’m down for the count anymore. But if you, like me, often get bullied allergies, let me know what’s been working for you down in the comments.

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