My girlfriend is allergic to something around or about me, please help!

I know that the laundry detergent I use now is probably not allergen free, however it's from a brand called ''Neutral''. This brand has a whole line of products including shampoos, soaps, detergents etc. specially made for people with sensitive skin and allergies. However it's true that it could still trigger some allergic reaction. I'll compare the ingredients of my girlfriend's and mine soon.

My girlfriend and I have had a couple more visits since I posted the thread and on every occasion she has had similar symptoms. Last visit we got a chance to do some testing at a specialist skin doctor. Blood testing gave no results even while she was having the symptoms. 

We're a little bit stuck again but since almost everything else has been ruled out there is not much left. I suppose the most likely thing at this point is some sort of psychosomatic response. Perhaps my girlfriend is sensitive to something around me and her in her daily life but it does not give any noticable effect, but the added sircumstance of me being around her of course has an effect on her body chemistry (hormones etcetera), this may cause her light sensitivity to something to become more pronounced.

Perhaps over time, if we even live together for a longer time, the symptoms will go away as her body gets used to the new circumstances, however as of yet we have not been able to test that. There is a small chance we will be closed together for a longer time as she may get an internship in my country. Perhaps that will give some more answers.

Anyway most of this is speculation based on some factual results. Perhaps if you can elaborate on your circumstances we can help each other to find a cause. Information like have you ever had an allergy test? do you have known allergies etcetera?

& Dolceb, yours sounds like washing powder - pillow cases washed in whatever, trigger the weepy eyes.

Good luck to you both & your girlfriends.

I'm sorry to hear you are having trouble as well. It's been more than a year since I created the thread and me and my girlfriend are still having troubles. All times we have met each other since she still had a reaction to something. She has medicine that works pretty well for her, but obviously it's not really an option for her to keep taking that her whole life. For one she may get more used to the medication over time which makes it less effective. 

As for a cause we are not a lot closer to an answer. We went to a specialist skin doctor that ruled out some other common allergies with blood testing, so that's not it for sure. However that particular doctor said it was nothing serious in any case. 

Our best guess is still that the reaction is due to a psychosomatic response. Since we're apart for months at a time her body is not used to being with me, so the abnormal imbalance of hormones and whatnot may trigger a reaction. The mind has a pretty powerful effect on the body as well, so who can say what the cause is exactly in the case of a psychosomatic response. 

In any case we are still trying stuff. I will be visiting her again in a couple of weeks. In advance I'm going to send some of my clothing, some of which I have worn for several hours. Whether she reacts to that or not should give us some clue. I'll let you know how that goes. 

Thanks for your reply. Also if you have any new clues, please share

Thanks for the prompt response. As unpleasant as this situation is, it is comforting to hear that there are other people struggling with this. I hope we can figure out what this is all about, even though your reason might be different from ours. It sounds like your girlfriend's symptoms are more severe than mine - on the other hand, my boyfriend and I have normally spent only a long weekend together at a time, not several weeks. My symptoms ease as soon as my boyfriend is not around anymore. The biggest issue is the eyes, that get very ichy and I can't help rubbing them. I'm using eye drops for allergy whenever the symptoms appear, and at the moment I'm taking cetirizine allergy medicine for other allergies, but maybe I should keep on taking them over the winter as well. I do have asthma and I'm pretty sensitive to mould, as I was exposed to it as a child. None of the other allergies affect my eyes, though, it's more respiratory issues, sneezing and itchy/runny nose.

I moved to the same city as my boyfriend two weeks ago, and now I'm curious to see whether symptoms will proceed. He has also moved to a new flat. I was pretty sure earlier that there was mould in his old flat, but his summer subletter didn't have any symptoms there nor any other person who has stayed there. I haven't stayed over at his new flat yet, so I don't know about possible symptoms. But he has slept over at my place a few times and I started having itchy eyes again. He had moved out of his old place already in May and went traveling for the summer, and has since washed his clothes several times, so I don't think it's anything from his old flat.

Writing the earlier comment made me think why I didn't get any symptoms when we slept in a tent few weeks ago. I think the reason was that, because of thermal underwear and sleeping bags, we weren't sleeping so cuddled up as normally. I only get the symptoms when we sleep in the same bed and thereby are very close - once we met only for a few hours to hang out in the city and my eyes were all normal after that. I wrote earlier that my best guess is that I'm allergic to his dander or sweat, mainly because I read an article about it. I have to say that my boyfriend doesn't shower every day (maybe every third day?), so maybe he has more dander than avarage? This is a very sensitive issue, that I haven't brought up with him yet, because it's a bit hard to tell someone to shower more often (it doesn't bother me otherwise).

Despite all the nuisance, your girlfriend can be happy that you have been ready to do so much to solve the situation. My boyfriend, unfortunately, doesn't take this very seriously. He actually takes it a bit personally, even though I try my best not to blame it on him. Now I'm going to ask him to try allergen free detergents, just to rule out that possibility, but I'm not sure if he will do it. Asking him to do this is a bit silly because I don't get any kind of symptoms from normal shampoos and face creams that I use myself; I'm not a heavy user of cosmetics but I use the avarage amount of hair spray, face creams and such. Ironically, my boyfriend has more of a natural approach as he doesn't use deadorant or creams at all, only shampoo and shower gel. That is why I'm very sceptical that it would be anything from detergents or cosmetics. I also travel a lot, stay at friends' places around the world, couchsurf and such, and I have never had any allergic reactions even though I must have been exposed to a very large variety of different kind of detergants when sleeping in those linen.

Anon991100, I know that you suspect psychosomatic response, but have the skin doctors checked if your girlfriend is allergic to your dander or sweat (I don't know if that's possible to test)? I'm considering seeing skin doctor about this, after I will have stayed a few times at my boyfriend's new flat. Thank you once again for sharing this.

I found an article about hormone allergy:

[b]http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-337895/The-man-allergic-girlfriend[b].html

I have not noticed any kind of link between my menstrual cycle and allergic reactions. However, my menstrual cycle is very irregular even at the age of 30 (which would require a diagnosis of its own), so it's very hard to say when my hormones or up or not. Also, I don't know if my own hormone levels really matter so much as that of my boyfriend's.

Anon991100: Out of what I have described to you about our situation, have you found any similarities with yours?

I also found this academic article about hormone allergy. So basically a woman can be allergic to her own hormones, as the sex hormone production is often increased when together with a partner.

https://www.hindawi.com/journals/isrn/2012/910437/

Like I said in the previous comment, I have had irregular menstrual cycle all my life (I'm now 30). My sister and mother have been diagnosed with high female testosterone levels (which cause irregular cycle), and I've been supposed to get checked already for years but I haven't got around to it - but now I will for sure. I don't know if it makes any difference but I'm having a hormone IUD for the fourth year now. Apparently, hormonal changes can lead to increased sensitivity to allergens.

However, incidentally, my boyfriend and I are in an open relationship, which means that I have had other sex partners during this one year that we have been together. I've never had the same symptoms with these one night stands, nor with any of my previous partners before this boyfriend. If I were allergic to my own sex hormones, why I wouldn't I get the same reaction with other sex partners? Either way, I think I need to get this hormone thing checked.

I think the main similarities are the symptoms, except for the swelling lips. Her main symptoms are the itchy eyes, which also she can't stop rubbing, and also the rash on her arms, but also rash on her face and parts of her legs. 

I guess her mentrual cycle is also not so regular, but to be honest that can have so many causes including stress, still it could be related. 

But other than that from what I can tell from your comments you seem to have more different allergies and sensitivities in general compared to my girlfriend. Like my gf basically has none, at least none that were tested. Also about sexual partners, for both of us this is our first serious relationship, and first intimacy, both of us have no prior sex partners so no way to tell if she would get it with other guys ( And we're not about to test that theory :D ) 

My shower habits are different from your boyfriend's. I guess my body odor can be quite strong, so I really have to shower daily to minimize that in any case. At some time we even considered it could possibly be an allergic reaction to fungus and bacteria that grow in armpits. Those bacteria and fungi are actually what cause sweat to smell. I shaved my arm pit hair to try and minimize that but my girlfriend's reaction continued. 

About an allergy specific to my dander, no we have not tested that. But I guess that is basically because the several doctors we have consulted don't consider that as an option. From what I can find on the internet there are no known cases of one human being allergic to another human's dander. 

But the experiment I told you about, sending my clothes in advance, should rule that out. After all my dander is all over that, so if she gets no reaction from that, then it's probably not the dander. 

I would also like to add that me and my girlfriend did spend some time together without allergy. It was actually the first time we met. We spent about a week together in total. That was about 3 weeks into my trip to her country at that time, so I had already been washing my clothes over there etcetera. However as I understand allergies, before you become allergic the body takes 1 or 2 weeks to actually recognise the allergen as a threat. So in case of that first encounter, that could have been the reason why she didn't get a reaction. 

hey! where you able to figure out the cause? I'm currently going through the same thing with my significant other and we've tried multiple nothings and nothing has worked.

Same here. Are your symptoms the same as everyone else's in the thread?