Monday, January 12, 2009

a dairy experiment

anyone who has lived with me knows i am often congested. i remember having 'allergies' since i was a kid but have never been tested for any. i also recall being young and never really enjoying milk unless it was really very cold. and when i was old enough to make decisions for myself, i stopped drinking it all together. since then, i have also noticed that when i drink anything milky or eat something creamy, i tend to become more congested and hack a lot more, which is as lovely as it sounds.

and although i love them, if i eat a dairy queen blizzard, 9 times out of 10, i will have a wicked stomach ache immediately afterwards. i am pretty sure my body has been telling me something to which i should be paying more attention.

i got a cold before christmas and am still fighting the remnants of it. or at least what i think is the last of the bug, but maybe it is just the general congestion that i have become so used to. either way, i am really quite fed up with being all stuffed up with all the snot and mucous that lives in my sinus cavities.

so i am going off dairy for 7 days to see if i feel any different. i did a little research on the www this morning (so you know it is true) and it seems that the doctors are out on whether or not dairy causes congestion, but some believe that the protein casein causes some bodies to produce histimines which then stimulate your body to overproduce mucous. which makes a lot of sense to me.

and these effects can take over 24 hours to present after having consumed dairy, so i could essentially be continually charging up my body to be snotty without even realising it. ew.

i did make an appointment with an allergist to figure this out once and for all (i hope), but that won't be until may so until then i am going to keep relying on the internet and self diagnosing! and in true blogging form, i will keep the trip dub posted on my mucous situation.

4 comments:

La Cabeza Grande said...

The trip dub is a font of knowledge, that's for sure. I was thinking about how I was able to diagnose my skin condition better than the dermatologist did - all based on teh Intertubes.

Sorry for you snotty sitch. Have you tried steam, Vicks, a neti pot or Mucinex DM?

Anonymous said...

Your gross, but I am curious to hear of your results. My curiousity mainly lies in the memory of when I was hungover and I almost threw up because you were giving me an account of what came out of you. Nasty.

Good luck with the experiment, I hope it works. But then I guess no more dairy for you, so should I really hope it works?

mmmmmm, DQ blizzard.

lu said...

day 2 and i had cream cheese (which i knew i was doing but felt it was necessary because what else would i have had on a bagel?) and milk in my t ho's coffee (which i totally did not realise i was doing until i already enjoyed it). and guess what - the congestion increased!

ok, i will be better tomorrow...

lu said...

oh, and yes i have tried the neti pot and i do love it! but it is currently packed in boxes in my garage and inaccessible. i have never heard of this Mucinex DM though, is it any good? what exactly is it?