Brief Hijack Interlude:
Maybe I've never had poison ivy because I BELIEVE I'm immune....
Being a terrible sufferer of poison ivy, I've looked into this. In the one North American manufacturing plant that processes urushiol, the active allergen in poison ivy, EVERYONE that works there eventually becomes completely tolerant to the chemical and thus resistant to poison ivy. It's probably your very long history of nearly constant exposure that's lead to tolerance.
There is evidence that ingesting a small amount of poison ivy on a regular basis will lead to the development of tolerance. I've seriously considered doing this, but it appears that if one takes in just a bit too much, the development of very severe itching at the point of excretion can occur. Not sure I want to take that risk!!
Now back to our regularly scheduled program.....
