Welcome to the Listening Time Podcast.
Hey English learners, this is Connor and you're listening to episode 260 of the Listening Time Podcast.
I hope you're doing great today.
They're often curious about the allergies that they hear about in the US, because in many other countries there aren't as many allergies that people have.
So this is a topic that interests different people.
And it's a topic that I wanted to talk about in this episode, because we recently went to get my son tested to see if he has any allergies.
So that's why this topic is on my mind.
And That's what I'm gonna talk about today.
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It's a lot of fun It's great practice for your listening.
This is something that you'll need to practice with listening to more than one person speaking, because in the future you'll probably have situations where you're in a group setting where There's more than one person with you and when they speak to each other in fast English, it can be really hard to follow the conversation.
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Okay, let's talk about allergies.
First, let me just talk about how we got my son tested for allergies last week.
We actually went down to Tijuana, Mexico.
It's much easier to do these types of things down there without insurance.
That's what we always do.
So we went down for this test and Also because my kids were going to go to the dentist.
I think I talked about that recently.
I forget if it was a normal episode.
I think it was.
So we also got this test done for my son. to see if he was allergic to anything.
And the reason why we decided to get him tested was because he has a minor issue with his adenoids.
Don't worry if you don't know what this is.
I didn't even know what this was until a few months ago.
But when you have enlarged adenoids, meaning they're bigger than the size they're supposed to be, it can cause issues with breathing, especially at night when you're asleep.
So my son has some issues with his adenoids and we suspected that it was due to an allergy, maybe like something was causing the his adenoids to become inflamed.
So we went down to take this test to look for the cause of his enlarged adenoids, And we were a little bit nervous about this because we thought it would be a painful test, because I remember when I had a similar test done,
I was 14. probably nine or ten years old, I think, and I got tested for certain allergies.
I think in particular, it was penicillin, this antibiotic, because I was supposedly allergic to penicillin when I was a kid but My parents wanted me to get tested again to see, and I remember that it was a very painful test.
They put many needles, these sharp things that they poke you with.
They put many needles in in my back, the skin of my back.
So it was not fun, it was painful and i remember it Pretty well actually, even though I was very young.
I have memories of this.
And so I thought that perhaps.
It was going to be a similar test that they would do for my son, but thankfully it was not painful like this.
So we were a little nervous beforehand.
We promised him a big reward for going and doing this test, but it ended up being really easy and not painful.
It was fine.
So I don't know if that's how it always is, but in case you were thinking about getting your child tested for allergies, this is something to consider.
My son had a very easy test and it wasn't painful, so hopefully you'll have the same experience.
And we got the results of this allergy test and it turns out That my son does not have any allergies.
He doesn't have a single allergy.
And they tested for many types of allergies different animals like cats and dogs and little insects, different foods, foods like dairy and eggs, and all kinds of things right.
But it turns out that he doesn't have any allergies.
So we're really happy to know that our son won't have to deal with allergies.
That's awesome, especially considering our The fact that so many people in the U.S. have allergies.
But of course, there's still the question, why are my son's adenoids enlarged?
So, even though we were very happy and relieved about that, he didn't have any allergies, or he doesn't have any allergies.
We are still a little bit concerned about the fact that his adenoids are enlarged.
However, he did get treated for this recently and he took medication for this and it really helped.
It helped a ton.
So now, even though he is not taking that medication anymore, he's still doing better than he was before.
So we're happy about that.
And My wife is now starting to do different nasal cleanses, I think they're called where you try to cleanse the nasal passages so that the person breathes better.
And I think that is going to help as well.
So my son should be fine, and I know that when kids reach an older age, these issues with adenoids stop being a problem really.
So as long as he's okay now and we're managing it well, he should be fine.
And regardless of all this, we're very happy that he doesn't have any allergies.
So let's talk about allergies in the U.S.
You might already know this, or maybe you've talked to people about this or maybe you've heard about this, but we have many allergies in the US And I'll use Mexico as an example to contrast the US, because I lived in Mexico for many years and my wife is from there.
It was interesting. when my wife and I first talked about allergies because quite simply, there aren't that many allergies in Mexico compared to the US.
In fact, when we were talking about different allergies that people have in the US, My wife told me that she had never even heard of these allergies when living in Mexico until she met me and we started talking about these things.
She had never heard of a single person in Mexico that she knew who had these different allergies.
And I'm not saying that these allergies don't exist in Mexico.
Of course they do.
We're just talking about the number of people, the percentage of the population, who have these allergies.
It's much lower in Mexico than in the US.
Here in the US, people have all kinds of allergies.
Kids have tons of different varieties of allergies, like allergies to nuts and gluten and dairy and eggs and shrimp and all kinds of different things.
And it's not funny actually at all, because these kids sometimes have very violent reactions, very strong allergic reactions to these types of foods, or they might be other environmental allergies, but specifically the food allergies can be very scary.
Like for example, in the US, many kids have a peanut allergy.
And if they have any peanuts, it can be really bad.
They can have a terrible reaction and it can be very scary.
So people need to be really careful and they have to make sure that if they eat eat at a restaurant or if someone else prepares food for their kids, they have to be completely sure that there was no peanuts that touched that pan or whatever.
You have to be really careful with that.
The same with gluten.
And that can be really hard because there's gluten in tons of different foods, right?
Dairy, like I said, is another really, really common allergy that people have.
Maybe they have skin problems when they consume dairy or...
It causes stomach issues or whatever.
And there are many other types of allergies as well.
And in many countries, These types of allergies just aren't that common.
I remember being in Mexico and a family friend was visiting and they have a gluten allergy.
And I remember that we were trying to find restaurants where they could accommodate someone who had a gluten allergy.
And I remember going to a specific restaurant and and I asked the waiter or perhaps it was the chef himself, I don't know, but I asked the worker there about this if they could guarantee that the pan they were using to cook this food didn't have any gluten on it from other foods that they cooked in the pan.
I was trying to explain this and he quite frankly didn't even understand what I was talking about.
Like he had never heard of this before.
I had to explain it in great detail to him.
And he was having a hard time understanding what this problem was.
He had no clue because he had never heard of this before.
And I
That would be the same in many different places around the world where people have never had to cater to a customer who has a specific allergy like this.
Like I said these allergies exist in other countries.
Of course.
Don't get mad at me.
Many of you might have these allergies, but what I'm saying is that in the US, the number of allergies tends to be a lot higher, right?
So these allergies are very common in the U.S.
People have to ask when they go to restaurants if certain foods contain certain ingredients.
I think of my friend's daughter, who has very extreme allergic reactions related to her skin when it comes to a number of different foods.
And my friends.
Her parents always have to ask if these different foods contain these different ingredients because if they do, then their daughter will have really bad skin reactions to the different foods.
This is common.
I know many kids that have different allergies related to their skin or other things as well, and i've had allergies in my life.
When i was a kid i was allergic to cow's milk.
Thankfully not anymore.
I don't really know how that works, but i don't really have this allergy nowadays, so i can drink milk.
But as a young child I wasn't able to drink cow's milk and my parents gave me goat's milk.
I remember drinking goat's milk as a young child and I also have different environmental allergies, like certain plants and types of grass have caused allergic reactions related to my skin.
I remember when I was working In my first job, I was told to take the trash out to the dumpster.
The dumpster is the big rectangular container where you put bags of trash.
So I was taking the trash out to the dumpster and I
I brushed past this plant like this plant touched my arm as I was walking past it to take the trash out, and that night I had this terrible skin rash, like all over my arm.
It was awful and it stayed for days just because I touched this certain plant and That wasn't like some crazy poisonous plant or anything.
It was just a plant.
But I had this allergic reaction.
I've had that with grass even and pollen from flowers.
Sometimes this can cause allergies in people.
I think this is very common in the US actually.
I remember when I lived in Oregon where there were a lot more plants and flowers and things like that that bloomed in the spring, like the flowers opened and all the trees turned really beautiful colors.
It was really beautiful, but I remember having allergies in the spring because of this, And so I had to take a certain medication to help with those allergies.
And I'm allergic to cats.
I cannot be around cats.
I get asthma actually.
I'm sure some of you have asthma.
I don't get asthma in just any situation.
Really, it's just when I'm around cats that I get asthma.
I start to feel like it's hard to breathe.
I wheeze, as we say, like I breathe hard. in a very labored, difficult way.
And I also get itchy eyes, watery eyes, they turn red.
It's just terrible.
I hate when i have this experience i can't be around cats.
I remember one time we stayed in an airbnb in mexico city and i didn't know that there was a cat living in that house and it was awful.
I remember that i just did not want to be at that airbnb at all except to sleep.
Like we stayed out all day and uh, we only came back at night to sleep.
But then it was awful at night because I didn't breathe well.
My eyes were itchy.
So I do not do well around cats.
And sometimes I even feel like I'm having an allergic reaction around certain dogs.
Not all dogs, but some dogs also cause this reaction in me.
So I have a number of allergies, actually.
Thankfully, there's nothing that's super life-threatening or terrible.
But some kids have this.
They have to be really careful.
I just remembered that.
Yes, as a kid I had some allergic reactions to antibiotics that were pretty bad reactions.
And That's why I mentioned before that my parents wanted to retest me for penicillin to see if I was allergic to penicillin, because I had had these really severe allergic reactions to antibiotics when I was a baby, I think.
So there are a number of allergies that I've dealt with and that many other people in the US deal with.
And so I'm very happy that my son isn't allergic to anything as far as we know.
Because other parents are in a much more difficult situation.
I know people, we have friends whose kids have terrible allergies and it affects their whole life.
It affects their daily routine, their sleep, their eating habits.
It's really hard.
So that's why I say I'm very thankful that my son doesn't have allergies.
I hope my daughter doesn't either.
It doesn't seem like she does, so I guess we'll find out.
But she doesn't seem to have any allergies either.
So I'm thankful and you should be thankful as well if your kids don't have allergies.
Maybe you live in a country where these types of allergies aren't very common.
And you might not even think about this, but just know that there are many kids in the US that have allergies and their parents need to be really careful, and it's not fun.
It can be a really difficult thing to deal with in some cases.
So I'll end with that thought of gratitude that I'm thankful that my kids don't have allergies.
I hope this episode was interesting for you and I hope it was good practice for your listening.
Remember that if you want my help to improve your listening and improve your pronunciation, make sure to sign up for my membership so you can get my specialized training that will help you improve in those areas.
And also check out my US Conversations podcast so you can practice listening to my conversations that I have with other English teachers from around the US.
It's great practice for your listening.
It will help you become accustomed to listening in a group setting when more than one person is talking.
Thank you all for listening to this episode and I'll talk to you on the next episode of Listening Time.
