Fragrance sensitivity

I've found out what I'm allergic to! Unfortunately, it's everywhere.

It's perfume, or more accurately, one or more of the many chemicals that manufacturers are permitted to put in large quantities in toiletries, cleaning products, even paint and glue. They don't have to state the ingredients on the label. Even products marketed as "unscented" can be perfumed. "Unscented" in this business just means "not as strongly perfumed as some of our other products".

I've suffered from general allergy symptoms for years, but because these "fragrance" chemicals are everywhere, I only found out by chance what was causing it. This weekend, while
queueing in the chemist, I got bored and sprayed myself with a perfume tester. It was like being hit with mustard gas. My eyes stung, I started to cough and gasp and retch. My daughter, similarly sprayed, was unaffected.

The next day we went to the supermarket, and my daughter accidentally smashed a bottle of hand wash. Again the "gas attack" reaction, again the nausea. This time the stuff hadn't even touched my skin. Airbourne particles were enough to trigger a reaction.

The products that made me sick contained linalool, limonene, benzo-something, hexa-something else and "parfum", which is code for "we're not telling you what gunk we put in this to make it smell nice". A quick search of the kitchen and bathroom turned up about twenty products containing some or all of these, many of which I put on my skin every day. I have bathed babies in this stuff! Is this twenty-first century child abuse?

I did a google search and found out about "fragrance sensitivity". The North Americans are ahead of the British on this one (when are they ever not ahead of us?) Second-hand fragrance is starting to be condidered as antisocial and unhealthy as second-hand tobacco smoke. Some workplaces in America are even starting to ban perfumes. I'd love to know how effective such a ban is in practice.

A perfume ban, even if it could be imagined on these "it's not polite to make a fuss" shores wouldn't be nearly enough though. I felt sick this morning after my husband used deodorant while I was in the same room. Last night he used too much conditioner on my little boy's hair, which made my eyes smart all evening. A deodorant, shampoo, conditioner, soap, shower gel and handwash ban would never catch on here. Especially when it's so difficult to find products that actually are fragrance free.

You have to love the irony though. I have been in contact with every unpleasant organic substance a small child can produce.You can roll me in vomit, half-rotted compost and hamster poo, and unpleasant as the experience will be, it won't make me sick.  If I have a nice bath to wash it off and use the wrong type of bubble bath, I'll feel sick and itch for days. Someone up there certainly has a sense of humour.