Illinois to Colorado Springs? (Denver: house, allergies, living in)

[Jonilo]

After visiting family in the springs several times, my spouse and I are looking to move there from Rockford Il. I would love to hear from other transplanted northern Illinoisans about what they notice as the biggest differences in living in the two areas.

Other questions:

My spouse and I are both counselors (lpc and lcpc respectively). Do you think we will have trouble finding jobs? Is the area saturated with mental health professionals?

I have a lot of allergy problems here in illinois- pollen and mold, mostly. Do you find less problems with that in CO?

I am thinking of moving out alone after I get a job, maybe even looking for house sharing opportunity, so that my spouse can stay in Illinois until we are sure my job sticks. Has anyone had good luck with that?

Thanks in advance for sharing your knowledge.

[CharlotteRJ]

I was born in Freeport.

Northern IL is not nearly so vibrant as Colorado has been lately. Colorado Springs does not have the most hopping economy in the state, but it seems to me to be far and away better than IL.

In terms of size, consider that the Colorado Springs statistical metropolitan area is very similar in size to that of Madison.

Allergies are highly individual, I've found. We lived in MD the last few years before moving here, and when we went to IL and southern WI, my allergies were through the roof, especially on my in-law's farm. Here, they're much better. We don't have mold, to speak of, here. The grasses and trees are different. I've been doing immunotherapy since we moved here, and have seen a great improvement, but even just moving here was better for me than MD, IL, and WI.

Summers here are much less humid. In the winter, snow melts faster than in IL, due to the strong sun and higher proportion of warm days.

We go up to Denver for "big city" stuff, but Denver is much less big city than Chicago is. Denver traffic is MUCH better than Chicago, though.

[Arrby]

Allergies are indeed a very individual matter. I am strongly allergic to juniper pollen from the Midwest, and if possible even more strongly allergic to the mountain juniper. I am only mildly allergic to any of the grass pollens in the Midwest, but wildly-off-the-scale allergic to some of the native grasses out here. Up here in Teller County the grass pollens that affect me are bad only after a wet spring (like last year), and are gone by June.

[Vision67]

Originally Posted by Jonilo

I have a lot of allergy problems here in illinois- pollen and mold, mostly. Do you find less problems with that in CO?

It all depends on your personal allergic response. Mold here is not a problem because of the dry climate.

I moved here in the late 70s from Phoenix. In Phoenix, I was allergic to bermuda grass, orange blossoms, olive trees, and gawd knows what else. It was a bloomin' sneezin' mess..

Here, at first I thought I had died and gone to heaven. I wasn't allergic to anything.

But after 3 years I became allergic to ragweed pollen. However, it's a short season. It goes from August 1 until the first good hard freeze, usually mid-September.

So my guess is that you'll see an improvement here. Plus, we have no bugs..

[lurtsman]

I have not tried the "moving without my spouse" idea, but it sounds like one way to put a thorough crack into the marriage.

As for allergies. When we lived in the Midwest, my wife had fairly mild allergies and I had pretty bad allergies. In Colorado Springs I have almost no allergies (I suffer from them on average 2 days per year). My wife on the other hand has significantly more allergy issues here. It's a wonderful place, so she is looking for some solutions that work better and longer than a 4 hour allergy pill. (The 24 hour allergy pills are not effective enough)

[Kar54]

Not from Illinois, but I could use a good mental health professional.