I would definitely email the RA, and I would make sure to have your meds on you at all times.
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Duly noted. I’ll email the RA and things should hopefully be fine. /appreciative
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Yes and no… I had a Chinese Statistics professor. Guy was talking to the blackboard. If you asked one question, he would answer to something else. The whole class was screaming “that is not what she asked.” It was total disaster. I tried his office hours. Absolutely useless… In the end he gave me solution manual to the text book (Statistics classic by Hogg and Craig). I survived with a B for the class. Surprisingly that was not my worst professor. That one was from Africa. Two top students could follow that guy. The rest were totally lost. That was upper level Math class in a top technical school, so we were not bunch of idiots…Bad professors in general the ones who do not understand what students ask (often foreigners) and the ones who do not know how to teach effectively. The best teacher is not necessary the one who published the most articles in the subject but the one who can teach…
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I hate to say this, but it might be worth asking your allergy doctor about getting an epi pen for this situation or ones that are similar.
And keep your meds with you at all times, since you might be visiting a friend in a dorm with cats.
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I’ll run it by my doctor and ask about epipens. But alas… cats. They’re so cute! But so stinkin’ deadly. /sighing
I agree with this. Better safe than sorry.
For people with allergies, keep in mind that new environments (even without the cat!) may present new allergic reactions. My kid experienced this and we had to make adjustments. Even though you’ll be near home, so hopefully no major change to pollen sensitivity for example, you’ll be in a completely different residential environment. Discuss with your allergist and be prepared.
But gracious, I hope the cat exposure can be addressed quickly! That’s a known issue for you… and I know many people who could not live comfortably that way. I truly hope you are supported and find a solution that works for everyone.
Thank you so much for your updates. 
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The epipen will end up severely interacting with the rare disease medicine I take, it turns out (spoke to my folks) so strong allergy medicine apparently has helped in the past when I was a kid and ran into cats. /musing
Guess I’ll grab allergy meds and keep it on me at all times, then. /thoughtful
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Has your doctor given you guidance about your allergies, given that secondhand exposure is so dangerous for you?
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Not really, mostly because it hasn’t come up for awhile. We haven’t needed to think about cat allergies or anything of the like so… I don’t know. I’ll have to ask my folks and my doctor and see. /thoughtful
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Good idea. And you may have to make adjustments as you go along.
My kid keeps Benadryl with her at all times. She also has a prescription for severe (not life threatening, thankfully, but debilitating nonetheless) reactions. She hasn’t needed to resort to that in the last year or so, but her freshman year was a challenge. She is at a college several states away so new pollens, etc to deal with too.
Haha… she switched from a vet-med plan to pre-med after a veterinary internship in high school. That was a miserable 6 weeks for her because we could not find a good solution. The meds that allowed her to live with a cat and dog did not come close to addressing exposure to pet dander in a vet clinic 8 hours a day.
Did housing no about your allergy before? It sounds like it?
Do they have a stated policy for allowing cats?
It seems like someone somewhere messed up.
If it’s their error, demand an appropriate accomodation. Period, end of story.
It’s not worth seizures or dying. To you…and especially to them (financially).
If you were made aware up front that the housing allows animals - then you have an issue.
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It is sort of easy to avoid cats. It isn’t so easy to avoid secondhand exposure.
My parents watched my brother’s cat for 2 weeks. When the cat left, my parents thoroughly cleaned the house, the couches etc. A few weeks later when we visited, my husband still had a reaction to the cats.
I am glad you have not had any issues so far! I would take this seriously (not suggesting you aren’t).
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Housing did not know about my 
lovely allergies before, no. Context is they emailed me YESTERDAY about the cat… literally with no heads up before that. Just… an email. And I wish I’d been given notice that my dorm would have a cat. They didn’t say anything about ESAs being allowed before this email, either. /sighing
They were like “oh the cat will be in its’ carrier if it’s out, etc etc” and I’m like… how can you guarantee the student will follow the rules? It’s just a bit frustrating. /sighing
Why did they inform people?
I mean, did the dorm rules show support animals are allowed?
If there was no such verbiage, I would push back.
Alternatively, all you can do is monitor and if you see one out (any animal), report it.
While I agree with getting an epipen (a no brainer), you shouldn’t even have to be in a position to need it.
All that said, if it was a disclosed possibility, then you’re sort of stuck.
If it wasn’t, I’d get a doctors note and push back really really hard.
They emailed our floor/dorm, but I guess they informed us so we’d be aware?
On the website it does say ESAs are permitted in certain dorms but there’s a lengthy process to even get one allowed, and in my process of thinking, I feel like we should’ve been informed much earlier, instead of 3 days to move in. /sighing
There was no disclosed possibility- they just sent that email, and that email alone, last night. I had gotten no other correspondence telling me there would be a cat in the dorm. /sighing
“Emotional support animals are allowed in student residence hall or apartment rooms with prior registration or approval.”
It doesn’t look like there are designated dorms that allow/don’t allow these animals. Even if you switch dorms there is no guarantee that a cat will not move in at some point.
I would contact the school and get something in writing detailing the rules and how you will be protected. I would make them aware of how dangerous your allergy is (doctor’s note) and make sure you have meds.
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Agreed.
But their ESA policy is public and thorough. It is difficult for schools to manage all of the ESAs that students are asking for (and for which they have proper medical documented needs) with the allergies of other students.
It seems schools could only allow ESAs in certain dorms and/or ask incoming students for allergy info…all I know is what I’ve heard some schools say that’s it’s difficult to manage. The school that one of my kids attended, with about 3,500 students, had somewhere between 100-150 approved ESAs each year, and as I said above, every dorm had at least one ESA.
Oops. Well, I guess I’ll just have to deal with the cat being in the hall, I guess? It should be fine. Hopefully. /shrugging
Hopefully you will get more details, and maybe a move is possible to a dorm with no ESAs. But I expect singles are in extremely short supply. Control what you can, ask the RA to speak about following the ESA rules and say we have students here who have severe allergies. I would also talk to your doc, as suggested above, since an EpiPen doesn’t work for you.
There can be exposures in many places, for example the person sitting next to you in class might be a cat owner (not sure if that could trigger your allergy or not). I am confident you will figure things out!
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You indicated that you have severe allergies and that your throat closes due to secondhand exposure. You need to do more than just “deal” with the cat being in the hall. You need to be proactive (not saying you are not).
As noted, secondhand exposures can be anywhere on campus (and off).
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