How Your Allergies Have Evolved over the Years - and When They’ll Strike Next

Wheezing, sniffling, and snotting can strike at any age, sometimes disappear for a while, then return with a vengeance later in life. So why do you feel lousy one decade, only to have your symptoms ease up the next?

Here’s how hay fever and similar allergic conditions evolve over the course of a lifetime—and what you can do to put them into a more permanent remission.

Why Do You Get Allergies Anyway?

No one’s born with allergies, says Donna Sharpe, M.D., of Duke Otolaryngology in Durham, North Carolina. But mom and dad do pass down a trait called atopy, or the genetic tendency to develop allergies.