It happens to me, too, and then I get bronchitis.
I thought I was alone in suffering a reaction to the stuff.
I am glad to know I’m not alone too.
Allergies are strange.
While I seem to be allergic to certain types of balsam (and FWIW, I learned that frankesence is a type of, in the same family as balsam), I don’t have the same problem with other types of incense or with pine.
I had a friend who was very allergic to pine. When she came to my house for a Christmas party, she mostly stayed in the kitchen or in my club basement but couldn’t stay long because I had a fresh cut Christmas tree in my living room and before long, she started having a reaction to it. But I am not bothered by them.
On the other hand, I get my worst allergy attacks, not in the spring or in fall but in the very late fall and early to mid-winter months. I’ve not gotten allergy tests but my doctor suspects I have an allergy to leaf mold rather than to pollen. I don’t get them all the time but when I do, I feel like I’ve come down with a very bad case of the flu – not just the uncontrollable sneezing and coughing and watery eyes, even a sore throat, but also very bad body aches and chills, feeling flushed and feverish but not actually running a temperature. But in any case, I’m pretty much out of commission until it passes.
The only way I know it was an allergy attack rather than the flu is that it comes on very suddenly but then is completely gone in 24 hours.
I am also highly allergic to Poison Ivy. I end up having to go on steroids for it.