Quote:
Originally posted by 33girl
Did we just not know better, are the kids too isolated from nature, or are the parents just overly cautious?
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(overly simplified answer)
It is generally considered that a lot of allergies today are our body's immune system needing something to attack due to a lack of exposure to things such as microbe-laced dust and animal dander when we are infants.
When my two oldest sisters were born and infants my parents lived in Chicago and my sisters were not exposed to many animals and plants at early ages. The next two children- my youngest older sister and I- were born and raised in a small town with exposure to a wide variety of animals and plants at an early age.
Result: older 2 children have mild to moderate allergies to dogs and cats, heavy response to pollens. Younger 2 children have no allergic response to animals or pollen. Hell- we're not even sure what I'm allergic to, just that everytime Septemberfest and Oktoberfest roll around there's something in the air that triggers an allergic response and then my asthma sometimes worsens.