I'm curious about something-
is it possible to be allergic to cigarette smoke? I knew of one girl in high school who said that she was allergic to it, but I never believed her because I had never heard of that before, or since then.
But now within the past year or so, I've been noticing that when I'm around my brother and/or his friends and they're smoking, or if I go to a restaraunt or concert or somewhere else where there are a lot of people around smoking cigarettes, my sinuses swell right up, and i can barely breathe through my nose, and i get a headache...
so it is possible to be allergic to cigarette smoke, or is the smoke just irritating my sinuses? and if it is an allergy, what substance in the smoke causes the allergy?

thanks!

Krista,
Yes -- it is a very common problem ---more than you would think. My wife is so allergic-- she actually gets asthma attacks from it.

Harry

Hi Krista2882,

One of my friends also gets the same reaction from people smoking around her and I myself get REALLY, REALLY bad headaches from the smoke too, so I don't think you're alone.




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airees

Its a very common allergy and becoming more common. My allergist says it is called an environmental allergy and the only treatment at this time is avoidance. I believe I developed asthma because of family members smoking around me when I was a child. The smoke gives me a headache, stopped up nose and makes my throat feel raw. Even smoke on someone's clothes bothers me. I went to a doctor once that had sign posted in her office that if you smoke you must shower, wash hair and put on fresh clothes before entering office. I guess somebody in that office was highly allergic. I went to a smoky bar to see a friend's band perform. The next day I had the worst asthma attack of my life.

My name is Lesley (the registration on this site is weird and when I included my name with the vowel e it rejected it for some reason!) and I also get really bad physical reactions to cigarette smoke, similar to many of the symptoms described. I was constantly ill as a child, my mother smoked and still does, I only started to feel like a properly functioning human being when I moved out of my parents' home at about the age of 20! My early life I was a health wreck and it was a miserable round of chest infections and coughs with no respite and constant headache and sore throat, and all because my mum would not listen to me (I knew what it was that was making me so ill) and would not stop smoking in the house around me. Not many people, even on sites against smoking can really understand how smoke in the air can affect a person so badly because a lot of them are ex-smokers and not at all allergic but are anti-smoking from a different perspective. Any harm they have from it is self-inflicted, but they have concern and sympathy for one another's health problems, and although I have shown sympathy for ex-smokers' with health problems I get little understanding back. I've been accused of being a hypochondriac and mentally ill and all sorts by various people, and my breathing difficulty triggered by cigarette smoke has been described as an anxiety attack even when it went on for about 12 hours and I was in hospital with it, and I was left untreated and struggling to breathe all that time, I had to sit up all night to get my breath and cough to clear the phlegm. Even worse I was pregnant at the time so that made me extra sensitive to smoke and I believe that my baby was lucky not to be damaged, not once did they check my oxygen levels or do peak flow or any tests at all, total negligence really and I did not complain officially because it would have been a lot of extra stress I did not need. I was exhausted from just fighting to survive it! I truly thought I was going to die, but I fought hard to live through that night and felt a little better in the morning before they got a doctor to me. If I had had any strength I would have throttled the doctor when she said she could find no evidence that I had asthma or anything on my chest. I know it was real, the phlegm was there and the chest tightness, and the cough, only worse than usual. I don't know how I came through it without medication, I still believe something could have been done to help me.

I'm trying to link up with anyone else who has been damaged by their mother or father smoking around them as a child, or anyone else who is very allergic or sensitive to smoke, whether they had their childhood wrecked by a smoker or not, and I am looking for others in the UK like myself. I've even suffered insults on anti-smoking sites because I have said things people don't like such as my insistence that to smoke around children is a form of child abuse (in my case it affected me so badly it was probably as bad as a daily beating). Even a lot of ex-smokers still come across defensive when they are confronted on these sites with my experiences, so even though they hate smoking, they say I am too "anti-smoker" rather than just anti-smoking and are very unsupportive of me when an anti-smoking site is the place I should get the most support! Breathing smoke HURTS, and the human lung is not designed for it anyway!

I found this board while google searching for other people with a similar problem to my own, as there seem to be lots of specific anti-smoking sites as well as support groups for most allergies and sensitivities but nothing for people like us, and I cannot understand why that is, surely we are not that rare?
Maybe some of you can get back to me to start something together?

Lesley

Sorry about what you are all going through with this, I think even if it is hard it's best to take no chances with it and find the courage to explain to people you need to avoid smoky places even if it means some ignorant people (smokers) think you are anti-social, why should we allow ourselves to be poisoned anyway whether we are allergic or not, since it is deadly generally anyway? Maybe if your friends care about you they will go with you to a non-smoking place to socialise, if not then they are not very respectful of your needs are they? Would they expect you to eat peanuts if you had peanut allergy? I think not.

Lesley

I am an ex-smoker. Smoked for over twenty years and have been smoke-free for 16 years! My son is allergic to smoke (diagnosed by doc) and I believe I am also. My son gets a runny nose, tight throat, coughs, headache, and itchy eyes. I notice mostly my throat tightening to the point I have trouble breathing. One sad point about this is I can never go to visit my parents. My father smokes like a chimney and will not stop smoking in "his" house. He does not smoke inside my home or car but is stubborn when it comes to his house. Well, look what that decision has cost him. He has this habit of having TWO cigs lit at once. One that is almost done sitting in the ashtray while he's smoking the other. The last time my sons were over there we had to leave after 15 min!

i get horrible headaches when im around it, and everyone around me smokes. its terrible. i've asked my boyfriend to try to quit, but he won't. he smokes constantly, and its really starting to get on my last nerve! i get headaches, my eyes get irritated, and i sneeze a lot. not to mention the fact that my clothes, bed, and even my dog smell like cigarettes! gross!!!

I have a problem with it as well. My downstairs neighbors have recently started smoking and I ended up having to miss a lot of work and go to the doctor a few months back because it was aggravating my allergies so badly.
The bad thing is that nobody seems to really care unless it affects them. At least in two apartment complexes I have lived in where this has happened, they basically didn't do much of anything and I ended up having to buy a bunch of air purifiers.
It does seem like it is becoming more common, though.