I ask this question seriously, although for many years I have just tongue-in-cheek claimed that it was a conspiracy on the part of Vitamin suppliers to impregnate their pills with viruses…whenever I embarked upon a course of Vitamin C tablets, mostly at the start of winter, I’d get crook within hours with a full-blown ‘cold in the head/chest’ that would take days to clear. Of course, the longer I took the tablets, the longer the symptoms would linger. It took me a few years to realise the correlation, but I’m slow that way, duh. Nowadays I steer clear of Vitamin pills like others avoid heroin and vicious crocodiles.
For the record, I am NOT a fruit eater. The only source of Vitamin C I get would come from vegetables (mostly cooked) and the odd soda (lemon flavoured, perhaps 5% juice, probably no vitamins left anyway) or whatever. Not exactly a lot, certainly nowhere near the recommended daily allowance.
But today I had a craving for an orange, and the fruit at the greengrocers looked mighty good, so I bought one, chopped it into nice little segments and sat at my desk at work devouring the lot. Within the hour I was sneezing and coughing and wheezing like a mad thing.
And then I remembered that as a kid, I’d scoff oranges like there was no tomorrow and end up with hives and welts right over my body. My mum just put it down to an orange overdose, but I wonder now whether my immune system is hyperactive to anything resembling Vitamin C?
Medicos out there, can you be allergic to a particular vitamin??
Howdy Hyper Aware. Posting ‘fair use’ cites and quotes from journals is considered fine if the sources are themselves cited. I think the rules here are ‘Don’t replicate the entire essay/scientific report’, but you might want to go to the ATMB forum for clarification on that from someone more au fait with the rools!
But thanks for the google heads-up. I’ll wander there for a bit more info, thanks again.
Kam, I’ve had the same experience! Any time I’ve taken Vitamin C with the intention of boosting my immune system, I’ve immediately come down with the flu, or at least a nasty cold.
I try to avoid eating oranges because sometimes they make me very ill - they seem to aggravate my IBS symptoms which in turn set off my fibromyalgia symptoms. Most acidic fruits have this effect on me, so lemons, limes and tomatoes are limited in my diet (but as lemons and tomatoes are such favourites of mine, I chance them rather more often than I really should).
Someone once told me to take the Vitamin C tablets that are Calcium Ascorbate rather than the ones that are Ascorbic Acid, but I have a feeling it was the dodgy naturopath my parents made me see when I was a teenager rather than a qualified medical practitioner.
Alternatively you might be allergic to oranges, and the vitamin pills you take might have orange in them. Vitamin C is in a lot of stuff in at least small quantities. For example, I just checked my boxes of Rice Krispies and Cheerios, and both had 10% of the recommended daily amount.
When I was doing Home Ec back in the late eighties, the single largest source of Vit C for the UK population was potates. It wouldn’t surprise me if you could hit your RDA just by eating big portions of pretty much anything of plant origin, particularly if it had some of the peel/skin left on. If you are eating some raw veg too then you’re probably fine.
Granted it’s from a spud-a-ganda site , but
Given that some people are apparently allergic to water, a Vitamin C allergy seems possible, but I would expect it to be triggered by more than just supplements and citrus fruit. How do you get on with Kiwi fruit?
Some people are allergic to citrus fruit, not the Vitamin C in it.
I myself once failed an allergy scratch test for citrus as a child back in the 1960s, which had the effect, among other things, of my very conscientious mother removing all lemon, lime, and orange-flavored candy from my diet. I vividly remember her hastily putting a bag of lime-green fruit jellies back on the store shelf as she abruptly recalled that limes were citrus, too.
Anyway, yeah, you can be allergic to citrus. Here’s a guy who was allergic to lemon soap. And here’s a guy who was allergic to mandarin oranges.
ETA: You can easily test whether you’re allergic to the oranges, or to the Vitamin C. Get some unflavored vitamin C supplement and see what happens. It’s available online.
Yes, you’re both right. It’s a vital part of the biochemistry around collagen (stops bits of you falling apart), as well as energy production pathways in cells (the krebs cycle?) and a few other things that are vital to keeping you in good working order.
It’s not inconcievable that a person could be allergic to it (on the basis that if you can be allergic to something as fundamental as H20, you can be allergic to anything), but it seems much more likely to be something related to citrus fruit.
I react to citric acid.
It is a very common tartness agent and/or preservative in many foods and other items. If it is in the shampoo, my scalp breaks out. Hand soap= red rash on hands and skin peeling around fingernails. Food with citric acid=if it is the first ingredient=sore throat, voice hoarseness, asthma, bronchitis within 2 hours.
Blood is preserved with citric acid, and even when the red cells had been washed, I had a reaction with the fifth unit. (and the premixed heparin IV solution that I was initially given after my blood clot/pulmonary embolus had citric acid in it-discovered by my sister when she read the label!)
When I figured out that citric acid was a problem for me, I started reading food labels and stopped eating anything with citric acid in it. I had a chronic runny, congested nose that cleared up completely. I don’t get sinus infections or bronchitis anymore. It’s wonderful.
There are plenty of references to it around. Aquagenic urticaria gets a ton of hits even on Google Scholar. However IAMNAD so I have no idea about the actual causation.
You are not allergic to water, you’re body is mostly water, you’d be constantly allergic to yourself. You’re taking the term allergy and applying it wrong as every thing so far I googled is.
An allergy is basically an autoimmune problem, it’s your body attacking a benign substance. This is why you cannot be allergic to something the first time. Let’s say you never ate a peanut, then you eat one, you will NOT be allergic to it.
What happens is your body mistakes the peanut (or rather something in the peanut) and makes an antibody to fight it. Thus not the first but the SECOND (or later) time your exposed to it, you get the allergy.
Since water is in practically everything it’d be hard to isolate and prove it. Just like chocolate a study from Johns Hopkins indicated almost everyone who came in with a chocolate allergy when study correctly and closely was NOT allegic to chocolate. It was something involved in the process of making the chocolate, from the machine to the sweaterners that was the real cause of the allergy.
Allergies are so overdiagnosed now simply to avoid law suits. When I was young I had bad hives, they came and went all my life, now I suddenly have anaphylaxis. What I don’t have any trouble breathing but cause my lips swells my doctor said I have it. No I don’t he just doesn’t want to be sued.
I mean so far I have turned up water allergies with people claiming cold also give them allergies, you don’t get allergic from the cold weather. It’s an autoimmune thing.
I am the same way… Almost every Juices, almost every Fruits… So far I found 1 Juice that I can drink… It’s by Mira and It’s Guava Nectar… No Vitamin C in it YAY !!!
Don’t feel that you are alone… I am too Allergic to Vitamin C. I know this is for sure, because I tried everything out there until I found 1 Juice so far with 0% Vitamin C
Although my Allergy is NOT extreme… But I feel the same way… Funny thing is… I think I have Celiac Disease as well.
So there must be something in my Body that can’t absorb Vitamin C, because of Celiac Disease since we need to Absorb through our Small Intestine.
I hope that many People will be Alert that they might be Allergic to Vitamin C and they don’t even know it :))… Took me 5 Years to figure this thing out…
NO, I didn’t go to a Doctor for this… Those Specialists keep on taking my Hard Earned Money!
Good Luck to you and to those who are Allergic to Vitamin C… I just wanted to say " You are NOT alone! "
Generally speaking, allergic reactions are triggered by proteins, but it’s possible for other substances to be the root cause - simple chemicals that attach to your own body’s proteins, transforming them into an allergen (cite).
I don’t know if Ascorbic acid will do that though.
