Can You Be Allergic to a Place?

That Fresh Start Feeling

When I moved to Adelaide in 2023, I felt like I’d finally exhaled after holding my breath for forty-something years. I was sleeping like a baby (which was suspicious, because I’ve been an insomniac since the womb), my nervous system felt calm, and even my skin was glowing. Adelaide had that coastal breeze, the slower pace, and a city that didn’t seem like it was trying to chew me up and spit me out. I genuinely thought I’d found my forever home.

The first few months were like a permanent Sunday afternoon. I wandered the markets, tried obscure cheeses, drank a little too much wine, and met some of the most creative, chaotic, and beautiful people I’ve ever known. I felt like I was living inside an indie film. Everything just clicked. For the first time in forever, I wasn’t just surviving. I was thriving. I wasn’t binge-watching TikToks at 2am crying into a tub of hummus. I was fine.

But here’s the twist. It didn’t last. Within six months, things started to unravel. Slowly at first. Like a button coming loose on your favourite coat. And then, all at once.

From Bliss to Broken Doll

Cut to two years later and I was in constant pain. Chronic inflammation had crept into my body like an uninvited guest who just wouldn’t leave. I had stacked on twenty kilos that felt like a protective shell and a punishment all at once. My body felt swollen with grief. Every three months, without fail, something awful happened. It was like the universe had set a trauma timer.

Job loss. Death. Friendship betrayals. Medical mysteries. Heartbreak. Isolation. And just for fun, some more heartbreak. It felt like Adelaide was breaking me down piece by piece, trauma by trauma, until I no longer recognised myself. I’d look in the mirror and see a ghost of the woman who had arrived with hope in her heart and far too many pairs of boots. I used to be sparkly. Now I just felt soggy.

The kicker? When I wasn’t being emotionally bludgeoned, I was actually happy. I really was. I made some lifelong friends who are now tattooed on my heart. I laughed more than I cried. I ate food that changed my life. I learnt how delicious palak paneer is and finally mastered my treadmill. So what gives? How can a place be both the best thing that ever happened to you and the slow poison in your veins?

The Brisbane Comeback

Three weeks ago, I moved back to Brisbane. It wasn’t dramatic. I just… left. No fireworks. No big breakdown. I’d packed up my life, my cat, and a thousand tiny heartbreaks and moved in with my mum. I expected to feel worse. More homesick. More anxious. More like a failure. But… I didn’t.

Within days, I started sleeping better. I was moving more. Eating less. Drinking less. Laughing without that bitter edge. I wasn’t in pain anymore. Like, at all. It was like the inflammation had vanished overnight. The twenty kilos I’d gained? They’ve started to melt away, slowly and gently, without any obsessive diets or intense gym sessions. Just a quiet, steady return to myself.

And that got me thinking. Was I allergic to Adelaide? Like, genuinely? Can you be allergic to a place? Not in the sneezing-hayfever-pollen-count kind of way, but in the deeper, soul-level, body-shutting-down way?

Allergies Aren’t Always About Pollen

When we think of allergies, we usually think of hives, sneezes, or peanut butter-related drama. But our bodies are weird little machines, and sometimes they react to things we can’t even name. Environmental factors. Air quality. Mould. Barometric pressure. Your neighbour’s dog. Or, maybe, an entire postcode.

Stress has a sneaky way of disguising itself as a physical illness. Living in a state of low-level fear, sadness, or even just misalignment can put your nervous system into overdrive. Cortisol becomes your bestie. Your digestion tanks. Your sleep becomes patchy. Your skin flares up. You gain weight without meaning to. You ache. You feel flat. You lose your spark.

When I tell people Adelaide broke me, I mean it in a literal sense. My spirit wasn’t the only casualty. My body was waving red flags from the moment things started going south. But I ignored them. I thought I was just tired. I thought I was just busy. I thought I was just being dramatic. (I often am. But this time? Not really.)

So… Can You Be Allergic to a Place?

I don’t have the science to back it up, but I have the lived experience. And my lived experience says: yes. Maybe not in the traditional allergen sense, but in a deep, cellular, something-isn’t-right-here kind of way. Your body knows before your mind does. Sometimes before your heart can catch up. And what it knew, before I was willing to admit it, was that Adelaide was hurting me.

Think about it. We talk all the time about gut instinct, vibes, energy. We cleanse spaces, we rearrange furniture, we open windows to let the bad air out. So why wouldn’t a whole city have an impact? Why wouldn’t a place carry an energy that either supports you or slowly erodes you? The body doesn’t lie. And mine had been screaming for a while. I just wasn’t listening.

Maybe I wasn’t allergic to Adelaide itself, but to what it represented: the unhealed grief, the string of traumas, the cumulative heartbreaks that clung to the walls like damp. It became a city of ghosts for me, a place where too much happened too fast and left scars I wasn’t ready to look at. And maybe the simple act of leaving broke the spell. Maybe Brisbane isn’t the cure, but it doesn’t hurt. And that matters.?

Leaving didn’t mean I failed. It meant I listened.

Lessons Learned in Geo-Biology (a completely made-up term)

If you’ve ever felt off in a certain place and couldn’t explain why, you’re not imagining it. Our environment plays a huge role in our wellbeing, and sometimes, it’s not about the place being bad. It’s about the place not being right for you anymore.

You’re allowed to outgrow cities. You’re allowed to move on from friendships, seasons, entire eras of your life that once felt like magic. You’re allowed to come home to yourself, wherever that is. Even if it’s humid. Even if it’s full of brunching gym girlies.

Your body deserves peace. Your soul deserves joy. And you deserve to feel good in the place you call home. So if something feels off, don’t be afraid to pack your bags and follow the pull. You never know what kind of healing is waiting for you on the other side of the move.

We Need to Stop Clapping for Basic Decency – Chaos, Crumbs and Clarity

In today's episode of Chaos, Crumbs and Clarity, we're unpacking why we need to stop clapping for basic decency. You know the script. A man texts back within twenty-four hours and we're screenshotting it to the group chat. A man plans a date more than three hours in advance and we call him a unicorn. A man manages to listen, pay attention, and behave like a fully formed adult, and our nervous systems short-circuit because we genuinely don't know how to receive it.Here's the truth nobody is saying out loud. The bar has been dragged so low that Satan himself needs a chiropractor after a competitive round of limbo. We've been culturally trained to be grateful for behaviour that should not require gratitude. We've been told these things are bonuses when they're actually the entry requirement. And in the meantime, women have been quietly doing the basic decency thing forever, without applause, while men get standing ovations for outputs we generated for them.Today we're talking about why a great man is genuinely just an average woman, who benefits when the bar stays low, the invisible labour women have been performing for free for centuries, and the friend-test that cuts straight through every excuse we've ever made for mediocre men. Let's get into it.For more visit BryJaimea.com or follow over on IG @BryJaimea

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