Can i be allergic to my friends 3 cats and not be allergic to mine??? or is that nonsense????

[biglips]

as my friend got 3 cats - two short haired and one is long haired. Everytime i go to her house, my nose is blocked and i get a headache till i come out of her house

My cat is between short and long haired but my nose is fine

or is it summat else in her house??

you can build up an immunity to your own pet, im allergic to cats but not my own and the same with dogs i got used to my brothers and he didnt affect me but usual symptoms with other dogs. try taking a piriton tablet before you go and it may keep the symptoms from developing.

yes i think i will for next time
ive only had my one year old cat for a year but my friends had hers for years and ive known her for years too. its strange!

I am allergic to my sisters dog but not mine weird

yes, I'm allergic to cats, but don't ahve a problem with our cat as long as she doesn't sit on me. My Dad's cats have me wheezing!

i'm terribly alergic to short haired cats but long or medium haired cats are no problem atall.. weird eh !

I'm allergic to some cats but not others. Haven't figured out what the deciding factor is.

Had a friend in Zim who had 2 cats, mother and daughter they were actually, I was allergic to one but not the other !

You do build up a resistance to a cat you are regularly exposed to - was certainly the case with my ex-DH.

Cat allergies depend on a couple of factors, and im rusty on this so apologies if i get this wrong.

Firstly, it is not the cat fur you are allergic too, it is most often the saliva, but of course they cover their fur in saliva when they wash. You can also be allergic to flea dander as well. So depending on what allergen (small protein that causes an allergy) it is you are allergic too, will dictate what type of allergy you will have, there are several types involving different cells of the immune system and i cant remember which ones are which. Also, one particular cat may well not produce the allergen as they are all genetically different. If it is flea dander well then if that cat doesnt have fleas (quite rare!) then you wont react. The extent of the reaction could well depend on the type of hair, for instance, if it is the sort of cat that sheds loads especially into the air, then contact wont be necesary to react.

Im not entirely sure that you are having a cat allergy type reaction biglips, although i coudlnt think what else, i guess your sinuses are getting inflammed as a result of contact with the allergen.

Does any of that make sense, i do tend to waffle and im rusty. You can become desensitised to allergens, although prolonged exposure can often cause worsening symptoms as well.

lucy - so how come I was most definitely allergic to one of my friends cats and not the other?

I could sit and stroke one of them all day and be absolutely fine, but if I stoked the other one I got wheezy, runny nose, very sore eyes (if I forgot to wash my hands before rubbing them) and generaly felt like sh*te .

Queenofquotes - the reason for this was most likely that you are allergic to the saliva of the cat, when you are allergic you are allergic to one particular protein or partical even. Your immune system recognises this as a pathogen (something which is forgein to the body and dangerous)and mounts a response (as if you had a cold bug or something similar) in certain cells of the immune system. The other cat that you are not allergic too may not produce that particular protein or "allergen" in its saliva, or skin even so it doesnt trigger a response.

One of the cells that react in an allergic reaction is a type of white blood cell (cant remember which one and its not important) that releases histamine, this then results in local inflammation, so hence the runny nose and wheezyness as the mucous membranes in your nose and lungs are affected. That is why anti-histamines work as they stop the inflamation. That is also why you often get anti histamines now in cold preparations.

I may have confused you more with my rusty immunology, but the upshot of it all is that, one cat produces something in its saliva (usually this) skin or fur that you are allergic to, the other doesnt.

It is not entirely clear what produces the allergic reaction in people with cat allergies, although a biotech company in america have isolated a protein known to cause allergies in many people and have produced genetically modified cats which do not produce this - hypoallergenic cats!! So all is not lost for cat lovers with allergies, you can still get a cat, a hypoallergenic one - the only problem is, they cost between 7 and 9 grand!!!!