My Weird Dust Problem
Okay, so I wanted to share something that happened to me recently. It involves my cat, well, kinda. More like the stuff the cat does its business in. Yeah, the litter.
We got this cat, right? Super cool little guy. Everything was fine for a while. Then I started noticing… stuff. Like, every time I went to scoop the litter box, my nose would just start dripping. Not like a cold, just… leaky. And I’d sneeze like crazy. A real burst of sneezes, maybe five or six in a row, boom boom boom.
At first, I just thought, whatever, maybe it’s dusty in that corner. Shrugged it off, you know? But it kept happening. Every. Single. Time. Then my eyes started getting itchy too. Like, really itchy and watery. It was annoying.
I started paying closer attention. It wasn’t happening randomly. It was specifically after I messed with the litter box. Pouring new litter in was the worst – clouds of dust, even if it said ‘low dust’ on the bag. Liars. My hands would sometimes get itchy too, where I touched the scoop or the box.
Figuring it Out
I was blaming the cat for a bit, thinking maybe I was allergic to him. But that didn’t make sense. I could pet him, have him sit on my lap, no problem. No sneezes, no itchy eyes. It only kicked off when I was doing the litter duty.
So, I figured, it’s gotta be the litter itself. The dust, maybe the perfume they put in it? Ours was that clay stuff, slightly scented. The dust particles must have been getting everywhere – up my nose, in my eyes.
Here’s what I noticed, symptom-wise, looking back:
- Sneezing fits: Like, uncontrollable sneezing right after scooping or pouring.
- Runny nose: Clear stuff, just running down.
- Itchy, watery eyes: Felt like I had sand in them sometimes.
- Itchy skin: Mostly my hands and arms if the dust settled on me. Sometimes little red patches appeared.
- Maybe a little wheezy?: Hard to tell, but sometimes my chest felt a bit tight afterward.
What I Did About It
It was pretty obvious I couldn’t keep using that same litter. So, I started experimenting. Went to the store and looked at all the options. There’s a ton!
First, I tried an unscented clay version. A little better maybe, but still super dusty. Still sneezed.
Then I found some made from different stuff. Like corn, or wheat. Tried a corn one. Less dust, definitely. The sneezing wasn’t as bad. Eyes felt better.
Finally, I tried one made from wood pellets. Big pellets, almost no dust at all when pouring or scooping. Bingo. That seemed to be the ticket for me. The difference was huge. No more sneezing fits. My nose stopped running. Eyes felt normal again.
So yeah, turns out humans can totally react to cat litter. It wasn’t the cat, it was the dusty, perfumey clay stuff we were using. Switching to something with way less dust, like the wood pellets, pretty much solved it for me. Just wanted to share in case anyone else is sneezing their head off around the litter box and wondering why.
