It’s that time of year again, hay fever has once again risen it’s ugly head and I’m suffering.  So what you may think, it’s only a bit of irritation.

I beg to differ. Let me run you through a typical day at present:

7:30am I wake up at the sound of my alarm, or more accurately I try to open my eyes.  You see during the night my eyes have been running which then dried sticking my eye lashes together.  Five minutes later I can open my eyes and so blow my nose.  A while nights build up of snot is thus removed – eugh. Next step is to take my hay fever tablet.

Some time later I’m ready for work, only I don’t feel like work.  The constant itching in my nose and mouth all night means deep sleep doesn’t quite happen.  It’s currently warm at night as well, but I could open the windows right?  Wrong, that lets more pollen into my bedroom and just makes it worse.

9am and I’m sat at my desk at work.  But I have a problem, I can’t see anything and my nose is streaming.  The morning commute brings me into more contact with pollen.  I alternate between washing my face and blowing my nose for the next hour, and then by 10:30 I feel about normal and have some how managed to read my emails and catch up on the nights alerts.

The hay fever has abated by lunch time so I join the others from the office grabbing a sandwitch from the local shop.  20 minutes later heading back I can feel my nose staring to run and vision is starting to blur.  The offer to sit in the sun on the grass is delined and I head back to my desk.  Another few tissues appear in the bin.

Home time and half way home my eyes take it in turns to stream down my face.  I make it back and amid sneezes find the time to blow my nose and wash my face.  It’s a glorious warm evening but I spend it indoors with the windows closed.  Only when it’s late do I open the windows to allow the air to circulate and my bedroom to cool, if I open it earlier the pollen is still in the air.

The constant sneezing and blowing my nose has tired me more than usual, while my eyes are sore with the near constant irriation.  So I head to bed in hope it getting a good nights rest.  Except I wont.

But you know what, for me it could be a whole lot worse.  Sure my eyes are irritated enough that I can’t wear contact lenses and they stream most of the day, my nose does need blowing every five minutes and roof of my mouth itches like crazy.  But I can at least still go about my day, I’m not stuck at home.  The tablets get rid of about 60% of the symptions.  And I know it will be over in a month.

So the next time you hear of someone with hay fever, please don’t think of it as being a minor problem to be ignored.  For those of us that suffer from it it has a very real effect on our daily life.  If we are grumpy and look a mess, give us a bit more space.

For the others with the Summer Flu, hang on in there.