When I was 10 years old, I was wheezing and had rhinitis symptoms, and had all sorts of allergy tests, showing I was allergic to about everything you can be allergic to-ragweed, pollen, cats, dogs, dust, etc. My parents had dogs at the time, and I never had a problem around them. I was started on antihistamines and was fine up until the time I was 27, when I spent the night at the apartment of a friend with a cat. I had a horrible asthma attack, and the ER docs put me on albuterol inhaler and I had no further trouble. I continued to live with multiple dogs and house dust and pollen, never needing my rescue inhaler unless I was around a cat for a period of time.

About five years ago, we moved to a new house, where the old owners had had several cats. We cleaned the house from top to bottom, but I still needed to start on Advair 500/50 and managed just fine. Then, two years ago, we moved again. I had no problem in our new house, and we have always had multiple dogs. I have never needed my rescue inhaler, and I have not even had to take antihistamines.

Like I've said earlier on this board, and I apologize for repeating myself, I had a chest cold about three weeks ago. It was a very minor cold, and I got over it quickly. Then I developed wheezing, shortness of breath, coughing, constant phlegm in my lungs. Chest x-ray turned out normal. Now my doc has me on Advair, Duoneb, Albuterol (neb), rescue inhaler, prednisone, and an antihistamine to see if we can get me calmed down. I am also on Augmentin, I guess as a precautionary measure.

My question is, could this suddenly be allergy-related, even though I've never had a problem before? I love my dogs dearly, dearly, dearly, and do not want to have to do without them. Or could the whole thing have been precipitated by that stupid chest cold? What does anyone think? I need to hear from the voices of experience.

Thank you so much.

There's probably no exact right answer - the whole thing could have been precipitated by the chest cold or could be an escalation of your symptoms from exposure to existing allergens (that's part of what makes this stuff so frustrating). It's not that different from the people you hear about who have eaten shellfish all of their lives and then have a sudden, unexpected allergic reaction that makes it impossible for them to ever eat shellfish again.

I think I asked you this before, but has your doctor ever mentioned anything about heartburn or acid reflux as a potential cause of this flare up? My asthma is usually totally under control but I had the worst asthma flare up I've ever had over the summer - it started in July and my symptoms were similar to yours, constant wheezing and chest tightness, coughing up lots of phlegm, irritated sinuses and discolored drainage - I was on multiple courses of oral prednisone and levaquin, had to have a CT scan, the works.

My allergist asked if I ever had heartburn and when I told him yes he got this funny smile on his face - prescribed Nexium for me (I thought he was nuts) - and within 5 days I was about 70% better. It's take a while for things to get completely back to normal but I'd say I'm now about 95% of normal. It sounds crazy but since he told me about this I've done some digging and there's lots of research that has connected asthma flare ups and acid reflux.

And there is a strain of pneumonia that will cause asthma. That's what happened to me after a bout of walking pneumonia. So that could be the culprit. Get to a pulmonologist and get your meds properly adjusted. And continue with the antihistamine...hope it's zyrtec since the dogs and cats seem to set you off. It's very good for pet allergies.