Really? It’s easier for someone to go on prescription medication than it is for someone to leave their dog at home?!?
I can see it if the people he was visiting have a dog - in that case, it’s almost impossible to rid the house of dander and fur, and meds might be the answer. But to me it’s completely unreasonable to expect that someone go to a doctor and get medication for something that’s easily preventable by just not bringing the dogs.
Please show where I said it was easier.
I recommended it as life-changing course of action which could, coincidentally, resolve the OP’s issue.
What a great idea! When my 14 year old cat is finished with being alive, I don’t want to get any more pets, but I’d still like to be around cats and dogs. Maybe that’s what I need - to become a part-time dog-sharer. 
That seems more than fair.
We visit our family (my husband’s parents) in Denmark every year. We used to go in the winter. Not only did my father-in-law smoke (heavily), but so did many other family members. And everyone smoked in the house, filling every room with a thick wall of putrid muck. One winter the volume of smoke was so heavy that my eyes burned to the point of non-stop running and my lungs burned so badly that I could hardly breathe through the pain. And after three or four days I developed pneumonia that put me in bed for the remainder of our vacation with a high fever, coughing up green phlegm. At first my husband thought I was being “melodramatic.” Not so much when he started feeling sick on the flight home and the doctor I insisted he see the minute we landed diagnosed him with pneumonia.
The following year I told my husband that I would not insist that his family not smoke in the house — particularly his step-father, whose house it was — so we would have to stay in a hotel. He was absolutely bereft over the idea and knew his mother would be heartbroken that her son would not be staying in their home while he visited. But I was adamant that I would not put myself in the position to get that critically ill again, nor would I impose myself on someone else to change their habits in their own home. When he told his mother this, she put her foot down and said no smoking in the house at any time for the duration of Thomas and Jill’s visit … by anyone, even her husband. Period. No exceptions.
And from that time on, everyone put their coats on and smoked outside. And even when we changed our annual visit to the spring, everyone who smokes still smokes outside only.
We get to see them one time a year because we, too, are overseas from where they all live. And not one of them was willing to risk our health over the opportunity to spend quality time with us. Shame on your family for not respecting you similarly. But since they won’t, if it’s really important that you get to see them at this particular time, then you get a hotel room and as soon as you start feeling the slightest bit ill in their home, thank them for the lovely visit up to that point, excuse yourself and leave. Your health is more important than their dogs. And I say this as someone who has two dogs and a cat that all get left behind with a pet sitter (who comes and stays at our house with them while we’re gone) every time we leave town.
Merry Christmas!
OK, point taken, you didn’t say it was easier. I presumed it would be easier to simply avoid staying in homes where there were dogs.
And really - do medications help that much with dog/cat allergies? The people I know who are allergic to dogs and cats mostly avoid being around them, even if they are on drugs. My brother, for example, does have prescription allergy medication, and is OK to come over to my dog-fur-laden-house for the occasional dinner party. However, he also gets pissy if people bring their animals to our family cabin and allow them to sit on the furniture or the beds. I was under the impression that there’s only so much that medication can do in the face of constant dog/cat hair.
I’ve been allergic to fur-bearing animals all my life. Even as an adult they can trigger asthma and rhinitis. As a result, of course, my family had no pets while I was growing up.
After I left home for good, they bought one dog, then another, then when they lived out in the country they had barn cats, one of whom they allowed in during the evening to sit on my father’s belly while he watched TV. His purring drowned out the TV sound.
Most of the time, I got along ok by just staying away from the animals, but if I started having a problem I would just have to leave. I figured it was my problem, the animals lived there, and it was because of me (although the genes for this were inherited) that they never had any pets while I was growing up.
So, in this hypothetical, I would do the best I could, but if I couldn’t make it with the animals there I would have to cut the visit short. I figure it is up to the others in the family to decide what they value more, my presence or their pets’.
Roddy
I have six siblings.
Even when they are not overseas we are not so needy that we have to visit at least once a year. Even back in the old days where it was too expensive to call long distance from the US to say, Germany. Telegrams if it was serious. Other wise, we used letters.
In today’s world of every which a way communication in real time with live pictures etc., why on earth is this gathering worth the angst?
Why does the OP want to visit in person with this brother? He likes being treated this way by him?
His parents will not tell their own children the rules in their house? Telling my parents what I will do & not do in their house? I was never that stupid. (even as a bratty kid ) I actually never thought of doing it no matter how inconvenient it was for me to abide by their rules.
I follow all the rule in my siblings, friends, places I am invited to no matter what I think of those rules-requests or the inconvenience or the health hazard… I am an adult, I can chose to not go there. All, of us are that way. And sometimes different ones of has chosen that for one reason or circumstance or the other.
But this is apparently a tradition in the OP’s family so It surely has already happened many times? What was done in all of those times? Why is this year different?
I do not think there is a reasonable, rational, workable, all approving solution for this family. They made it that way & with the explanations of what the others think and will and will not do and how they keep their word or not, well … ::: shakes head & wanders away ::::
I agree with you that a dander-free sleeping room is essential to your health. I’m sorry that your family doesn’t understand the severity of the problem they are causing you. Since your parents are allowing your siblings to bring dogs, your only alternative is to stay elsewhere to try and limit your exposure to the animals.
Thank you. I’ve never heard of doing this. Taking your dog on a small errand with you? Sure. But on a week-long trip? I don’t know anybody who does that. Nor would they put them in a kennel. You leave your pets at home and have someone else take care of them.
This is a no-brainer. Mom and dad could solve the problem by having a “no-pet” policy. It’s bad enough for the allergy sufferer to have to react to the dog hair on people’s clothing. Why make him suffer more?
I have dogs and love dogs, but I would kennel them (and have kenneled them before) or get a pet-sitter or some other thing rather than make someone else sick. I could see if there were some inconvenience or other annoying details, but actually making someone else ill when there was an easy option to not do so is just plain rude and inconsiderate. Also that your family knows you are not being just whiny or problematic- that it is a real problem with a known history- is enough to convince me to not do anything make you ill.
If can’t pay for 2 weeks of boarding or having a home sitter, & none of the family live anywhere close, should they help with the cost or just well to do pet owners can attend the gathering?
Why not just ask the allergy person to come at another time. Why does the majority have to bow before him? Especially if the majority have dogs?
( devils advocate )
When you have a pet, part of the cost is having someone look after your pet while you’re on a vacation. The siblings in this scenario are looking at their visit to their parent’s house incorrectly, in my opinion - they see it as an opportunity to travel with their pets, when it should be considered as any other vacation where you don’t take your pets.
I have to wonder if those of you advocating that the allergic person drug himself up and still be miserable would have a different opinion if, instead of animal dander, he was allergic to cigarette smoke and the siblings insisted upon smoking indoors nonstop. Bringing your pets to someone else’s home for a week and smoking indoors both pollute the shared environment.
missred, who loves dogs and cats and smoked outdoors for years
To me, a vacation without at least one of my dogs is no vacation at all – yes, I need my dogs around me that much. My trips are almost always organized around the requirements of traveling with dogs. So I understand wanting to bring a dog.
That said, if I was the OP, I would rent a hotel room, and meet my family for dinners in a restaurant. Even better: act cheerful about it. That really will flummox them. In my experience, family dynamics rarely change, and if they don’t care about your health now, they never will, so it is really your problem to deal with.
This seems reasonable to you? “I am never going to see my brother again. He’s only in the country once a year, and he goes to my parents’ house. I stay away for that week because he’s allergic to my dogs, they make him miserable, and obviously, I can’t be away from them for a whole week once a year. It’s a shame my kids will never know him, and my mom would probably like to see us all together, but my dogs are part of the family, you know?”
Upthread I suggested that the dog owning relatives could find a voluntary dog-sharer(s) for their dog near them. They’ve got a whole year ahead of them to make it work. You could ask it as a Christmas gift for next year. By finding such a sitter, they would be giving themselves a gift as well. Such a sitter nearby always comes in handy and it is a great way to get mutually benificial contacts with people in the neighborhood.
I’m sure many people would love such an offer, if you put it on Craigslist or told your local animal shelter. Easy to try out.
In my case, the allergy medication (I’m on Claritin all the time) helps, but it doesn’t eliminate the allergies, particularly if I’m in a cat-heavy environment. I’ve had people get pissy about my allergies, and, believe me, it doesn’t feel good.
You’re telling your brother that your dogs are more important than he is. You can be away from your brother for “the rest of your life” but you can’t leave your dogs for a week?
You’re a resourceful, imaginative person – I’ve seen it. It’s hard to believe you haven’t found a way to work this out.
I am speaking in the voice of the people that keep saying “Why can’t he go another time? Why does he have to visit when the dogs are there”.