I usually see the PA now instead of Dr. Hengy. Nothing against him—good doctor, smart guy—but his office is in Manistee. That’s a 40-minute drive. The PA is in Ludington, just a few blocks from my house. Easy choice.
I’ve been on allergy shots since 2021. If you’ve ever done them, you know the routine. You start twice a week, then once a week, then every other week. That part is easy to remember.
Then it gets weird.
Every three weeks. Once a month.
That’s where I fell off.
I hadn’t been in since December. I didn’t even realize it had been that long, but she told me—almost five months.
And I’ll be honest, I was expecting a lecture.
Didn’t happen.
She was actually kind of excited.
She said, “You’ve gone almost five months without shots, and you’re not having symptoms?”
I said, “Yeah, I feel fine.”
She said, “It’s allergy season… let’s test it.”
I liked that.
No guilt. No pressure. Just, “let’s see what happens.”
So we decided to stop the shots—for now—and see how I do.
I asked her how long I could go without having to start all over, and she said quite a while. That made the decision easier.
I also brought up Singulair. I told her if I had stayed on shots, I was thinking about coming off it. But honestly, I don’t have side effects from it. It’s cheap. It works. So for now, I’m staying on it.
Then I did something I don’t usually do with doctors.
I was honest.
I told her I’ve actually been doing fine in the spring even before the shots—as long as I’m on Singulair. And I admitted that part of the reason I went along with allergy shots in the first place was because Dr. Hengy was the first doctor in a long time who actually wanted to try something different.
That’s hard to say to a doctor.
But I said it.
And she handled it perfectly. Didn’t get defensive. Didn’t push back. Just took it in and moved on.
That felt good.
We set up a six-month follow-up. I told her straight up, “If I don’t schedule it now, I won’t come back.” She laughed and agreed. At that appointment, we’ll decide what to do next.
She also said if I start having symptoms at all, just call and we’ll restart the shots.
Simple.
Now, here’s the honest part.
I can’t say I’ve noticed a huge difference with the allergy shots.
But I also haven’t really tested it.
Flipping through old baseball cards has always been a trigger for me—tight chest, symptoms. I haven’t tried that lately. But I have been going through old photos, and that hasn’t bothered me at all.
So maybe they helped.
Or maybe the Singulair is doing most of the work.
Hard to say.
And yeah, part of me thinks, “well… it didn’t hurt.”
I hate that phrase. I hear it all the time at work with albuterol. But in this case, it kind of applies.
Either way, I walked out of that appointment feeling good.
No pressure. No lectures. A plan that made sense.
We’ll see what happens.
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