collapse

* Recent Posts

"Christ Is King" by Altair
[Today at 01:09:34 am]


Re: Cill Shift Schedule by SunflowerP
[Yesterday at 11:04:57 pm]


Re: Stellar Bling: The Good, the Bad, the OMG! by SunflowerP
[March 21, 2024, 11:21:37 pm]


Re: Spring Has Sprung! 2024 Edition by SunflowerP
[March 21, 2024, 10:24:10 pm]


Stellar Bling: The Good, the Bad, the OMG! by Altair
[March 21, 2024, 02:52:34 pm]

Author Topic: Chronic Lung Illness Sufferers  (Read 15239 times)

Aine Rayne

  • Master Member
  • ******
  • Join Date: Jan 2012
  • Posts: 438
  • Total likes: 0
    • View Profile
Re: Chronic Lung Illness Sufferers
« Reply #60 on: November 03, 2012, 12:50:30 am »
Quote from: Shine;79437
That sucks. At least your body's warning you. Some asthmatics don't get that kind of warning. For whatever reason, they have an attack and can't wake up. That scares the shit out of me. Dunno about you.

 
I'm not even sure what you mean by can't wake up. As someone who doesn't swim because drowning is a fear based entirely on the pain and panic of an asthma attack, thinking that I'm just stuck in dreams during an attack is something that bothers me. Most of the time I don't get a dream warning, I just wake up struggling or wheezing.
Finding the Secret Places This is my new blog

Shine

  • Sr. Master Member
  • *******
  • Join Date: Nov 2011
  • Posts: 912
  • Total likes: 0
    • View Profile
    • http://houseofthelion.wordpress.com/
Re: Chronic Lung Illness Sufferers
« Reply #61 on: November 03, 2012, 01:00:21 am »
Quote from: Aine Rayne;79438
I'm not even sure what you mean by can't wake up. As someone who doesn't swim because drowning is a fear based entirely on the pain and panic of an asthma attack, thinking that I'm just stuck in dreams during an attack is something that bothers me. Most of the time I don't get a dream warning, I just wake up struggling or wheezing.

 
They just can't/don't wake up, most likely because their symptoms came on so suddenly, there wasn't time to react. Or they're on medicines that make them sleep super deeply.

One of those "you don't realize you're in trouble until it's too late" kind of things, would be my guess. I've had one or two close calls myself. Thank the gods I made it just in time.

Damn, asthma can be grim. :(
Leave your darkness with me, and I will make you shine.

Aine Rayne

  • Master Member
  • ******
  • Join Date: Jan 2012
  • Posts: 438
  • Total likes: 0
    • View Profile
Re: Chronic Lung Illness Sufferers
« Reply #62 on: November 03, 2012, 01:10:50 am »
Quote from: Shine;79439
They just can't/don't wake up, most likely because their symptoms came on so suddenly, there wasn't time to react. Or they're on medicines that make them sleep super deeply.

One of those "you don't realize you're in trouble until it's too late" kind of things, would be my guess. I've had one or two close calls myself. Thank the gods I made it just in time.

Damn, asthma can be grim. :(

 
I've only had a couple asthma attacks that bad, and luckily I was awake. Well, not quite, it was a normal, "damn I can't breathe" wake up from sleep sort of thing, but more intense. I remember several times in particular, being totally exhausted, just laying in bed, tossing and turning until I could find a position to breathe and just suffering like that until I had the strength to get up and find my inhaler or set up my nebulizer. One particular instance I'm referring to was when I had the flu and didn't know yet that I had walking pneumonia. It was awful. It was the coughing and feeling of suffocating that woke me. I remember doing the toss until I can breathe thing and getting my nebulizer when I was able and calling my mom from bed. I think it was midnight, she may have been downstairs. But I remember her hearing me call and the nebulizer running and she decided to take me to the ER for the second or third time in those three horrid weeks.

Or, maybe I was downstairs. honestly those three weeks are all mixed up because I was either in bed or on the couch and either sleep, drugged (damn codeine cough syrup) or eating/taking medicine and maybe watching tv. Couldn't bother reading, too tired, sore, with the splitting headache from constantly coughing and blowing my nose and just fucking wheezing. I think it may have been the second time for the ER, cuz I remember going a couple days after my mom took a chance and sent me to school for a day in the hopes that I was feeling better and getting at least a little learning. I only remember lunch from that day and feeling miserable and having everyone worry about me.
Finding the Secret Places This is my new blog

Shine

  • Sr. Master Member
  • *******
  • Join Date: Nov 2011
  • Posts: 912
  • Total likes: 0
    • View Profile
    • http://houseofthelion.wordpress.com/
Re: Chronic Lung Illness Sufferers
« Reply #63 on: November 03, 2012, 01:19:07 am »
Quote from: Aine Rayne;79443
I've only had a couple asthma attacks that bad, and luckily I was awake. Well, not quite, it was a normal, "damn I can't breathe" wake up from sleep sort of thing, but more intense. I remember several times in particular, being totally exhausted, just laying in bed, tossing and turning until I could find a position to breathe and just suffering like that until I had the strength to get up and find my inhaler or set up my nebulizer. One particular instance I'm referring to was when I had the flu and didn't know yet that I had walking pneumonia. It was awful. It was the coughing and feeling of suffocating that woke me. I remember doing the toss until I can breathe thing and getting my nebulizer when I was able and calling my mom from bed. I think it was midnight, she may have been downstairs. But I remember her hearing me call and the nebulizer running and she decided to take me to the ER for the second or third time in those three horrid weeks.

Or, maybe I was downstairs. honestly those three weeks are all mixed up because I was either in bed or on the couch and either sleep, drugged (damn codeine cough syrup) or eating/taking medicine and maybe watching tv. Couldn't bother reading, too tired, sore, with the splitting headache from constantly coughing and blowing my nose and just fucking wheezing. I think it may have been the second time for the ER, cuz I remember going a couple days after my mom took a chance and sent me to school for a day in the hopes that I was feeling better and getting at least a little learning. I only remember lunch from that day and feeling miserable and having everyone worry about me.

 
Geez, that's scary. Kind of like breathing through a straw? (A coffee-stirrer-strawmabobber, not a regular straw.)

Meh, I remember having an asthma attack, trying to wake my mom, and her then boyfriend telling me to go away. So I spent the next six hours breathing as if through a straw. I was steamed about it already, but when our lil chihuahua broke its leg the next morning, Mom had a conniption. Tears streaming down her face, heaving with sobs, etc. :stop: Freak out about a chihuahua, but fk your kid. Fantastic priorities.

I used to live in a house with black mold. Every winter, I'd get a breathing illness so bad I could scarcely move. Never took medicine for it, either. Not even a single puff from an inhaler. And I'd often spend hours and hours by myself. :( Those episodes were straw-breathing ones, too. Nobody ever worried. It's annoying to have people concerned about you all the time, but the diametric opposite is worse.
« Last Edit: November 03, 2012, 01:20:24 am by Shine »
Leave your darkness with me, and I will make you shine.

Aine Rayne

  • Master Member
  • ******
  • Join Date: Jan 2012
  • Posts: 438
  • Total likes: 0
    • View Profile
Re: Chronic Lung Illness Sufferers
« Reply #64 on: November 03, 2012, 01:30:16 am »
Quote from: Shine;79444
Geez, that's scary. Kind of like breathing through a straw? (A coffee-stirrer-strawmabobber, not a regular straw.)

Meh, I remember having an asthma attack, trying to wake my mom, and her then boyfriend telling me to go away. So I spent the next six hours breathing as if through a straw. I was steamed about it already, but when our lil chihuahua broke its leg the next morning, Mom had a conniption. Tears streaming down her face, heaving with sobs, etc. :stop: Freak out about a chihuahua, but fk your kid. Fantastic priorities.

I used to live in a house with black mold. Every winter, I'd get a breathing illness so bad I could scarcely move. Never took medicine for it, either. Not even a single puff from an inhaler. And I'd often spend hours and hours by myself. :( Those episodes were straw-breathing ones, too. Nobody ever worried. It's annoying to have people concerned about you all the time, but the diametric opposite is worse.

 
Ugh, that's awful! My family is all sorts of contradictory about my health. They're concerned and compassionate while simultaneously being all snooty about how I'm not doing what they think I should be or dramatic or whatever. Not all the time, but it happens and it's aggravating. It's worse having a doctor like that, so glad I ditched that snotty bitch after high school, but I also feel like my next doctor was too quick to give me prednisone. He was willing to discuss and change my controller meds and depression meds though, gotta give him props for that. I just never felt like I had his full attention though.

Also, I've never related to the straw metaphor. Ever. I've breathed through a straw for boredom, it sortakindamaybealmostnotreally gets it, but I really have just never found it worked for me. I never "got it". I know what you mean though, but usually I feel like my lungs have shrunk all the way to my heart level and I was trying to suck air in and reinflate them with my entire body. When I get "straw tight" my whole body works and it hurts so bad. Coughing is generally the only way I get air out efficiently when I'm that bad. It sucks not being able to talk, only enough air for three words at a time, if that. Then people telling you to slow down because the bad breathing of a severe attack makes you talk fast which makes them panic even more because now they're not only watching how hard you're working to breathe and how much you're suffering but they hear your wheezing and the panic of your body as it moves air much too fast. As they hear how hard it is just for you to say "get my inhaler".

Gods it's nice to be able to commiserate about these troubles.
Finding the Secret Places This is my new blog

Shine

  • Sr. Master Member
  • *******
  • Join Date: Nov 2011
  • Posts: 912
  • Total likes: 0
    • View Profile
    • http://houseofthelion.wordpress.com/
Re: Chronic Lung Illness Sufferers
« Reply #65 on: November 03, 2012, 01:41:32 am »
Quote from: Aine Rayne;79446
Ugh, that's awful! My family is all sorts of contradictory about my health. They're concerned and compassionate while simultaneously being all snooty about how I'm not doing what they think I should be or dramatic or whatever. Not all the time, but it happens and it's aggravating. It's worse having a doctor like that, so glad I ditched that snotty bitch after high school, but I also feel like my next doctor was too quick to give me prednisone. He was willing to discuss and change my controller meds and depression meds though, gotta give him props for that. I just never felt like I had his full attention though.

Also, I've never related to the straw metaphor. Ever. I've breathed through a straw for boredom, it sortakindamaybealmostnotreally gets it, but I really have just never found it worked for me. I never "got it". I know what you mean though, but usually I feel like my lungs have shrunk all the way to my heart level and I was trying to suck air in and reinflate them with my entire body. When I get "straw tight" my whole body works and it hurts so bad. Coughing is generally the only way I get air out efficiently when I'm that bad. It sucks not being able to talk, only enough air for three words at a time, if that. Then people telling you to slow down because the bad breathing of a severe attack makes you talk fast which makes them panic even more because now they're not only watching how hard you're working to breathe and how much you're suffering but they hear your wheezing and the panic of your body as it moves air much too fast. As they hear how hard it is just for you to say "get my inhaler".

Gods it's nice to be able to commiserate about these troubles.

 
Arrrrgggggh, yes, the half-condescending-half-concerned bull crap. >_<' Followed shortly after with these people is often a remark along the lines of, "your asthma is psychosomatic." Psychosomatic? Fool, wait until this wheezing stops and then I will SHOW YOU psycho.

Or the doctors who insist you take x-med when x-med makes you even sicker. Doctor generally knows best, but s/he doesn't. Always. Listen. I once had this conversation:

Quote
Moi: The Flovent gives me bronchospasms.

Doc: Okay, so we'll up the dose.

Moi: I'd rather try something else.

Doc: Remember you take deep, slow breaths and--

Moi: Seriously, I'm not taking my emergency inhaler every time I take my long term.

Doc: --and if you need to, take your emergency inhaler.

Moi: (thinking) and now it's time to go find a pulmonologist and stay the hell away from internists.

END


The straw metaphor is for that feeling some asthmatics get when their airways are narrowed through inflammation. If your asthma is more gunky about its inflammation (rather than swell-y), maybe the straw metaphor doesn't work.

It is fun, on occasion, to see the panicked look on people's faces when you choke out a request for your inhaler. Then again, the barrage of, "are you okay? OMGOMGOMG are you okay? Do you need an ambulance? Should I hit you on the back [editor's note: you hit me, I hit you. In the face. With a chair.]?" gets a bit much. XD Still, when it comes to not enough help or too much, the too much is more workable.

And yesssss, it's great to find someone who can relate so well.
Leave your darkness with me, and I will make you shine.

Aine Rayne

  • Master Member
  • ******
  • Join Date: Jan 2012
  • Posts: 438
  • Total likes: 0
    • View Profile
Re: Chronic Lung Illness Sufferers
« Reply #66 on: November 03, 2012, 02:10:29 am »
Quote from: Shine;79448
Arrrrgggggh, yes, the half-condescending-half-concerned bull crap. >_<' Followed shortly after with these people is often a remark along the lines of, "your asthma is psychosomatic." Psychosomatic? Fool, wait until this wheezing stops and then I will SHOW YOU psycho.

Or the doctors who insist you take x-med when x-med makes you even sicker. Doctor generally knows best, but s/he doesn't. Always. Listen. I once had this conversation:



The straw metaphor is for that feeling some asthmatics get when their airways are narrowed through inflammation. If your asthma is more gunky about its inflammation (rather than swell-y), maybe the straw metaphor doesn't work.

It is fun, on occasion, to see the panicked look on people's faces when you choke out a request for your inhaler. Then again, the barrage of, "are you okay? OMGOMGOMG are you okay? Do you need an ambulance? Should I hit you on the back [editor's note: you hit me, I hit you. In the face. With a chair.]?" gets a bit much. XD Still, when it comes to not enough help or too much, the too much is more workable.

And yesssss, it's great to find someone who can relate so well.


I usually get the "if you exercised and ate right and got rid of your pets and cleaned your room and didn't live with a smoker and etc" bullshit. Now, to be fair I have set off asthma attacks from being too emotional, but psychosomatic would make me flip shit too. I have a psychosomatic problem, it gives me stomach pain and nausea and probably these godsdamned hives whenever I'm overly stressed, upset or anxious.

I did have a terrible allergist with no bedside manner either. She gave me advair and was always brusque when I mentioned issues to her. She was a medicine doc, one who won't really recommend or care about anything else. Though you seem to have a bad string of luck with internists O.o like for real, how much of an asshole can you be to talk over your patient telling you a medicine is making them worse and that it's really fucking retarded to tell them to use their inhaler to take a medicine that's hurting them when it's meant to help?!

And my high school doctor. Always on about exercise. Everything, including my exercise, allergen, weather, emotion induced asthma, could be solved with exercise. You know she told me I should only eat half a bagel with nothing on it? Like who eats a cold or toasted bagel with no butter or cream cheese? I might as well not bother -_- She was constantly going on about her successfully athletic asthmatic patients. She didn't expect me to be an athlete, but those up and down every hour of forty steps per floor between classes and all that walking to and from school every day was nothing. And it's like, bitch take your ass up them fucking steps every day and tell me that shit ain't exercise! I'll find you the athletes in the school who hate them goddamn steps! Tell me that hill I climb every day, that gave me a mild attack every day in winter without fail, even with a scarf over my face, is nothing.

Oh and watching panic on others, you should've seen me waking my boyfriend when I had an asthma attack at his school. I had been up since 4 am, woke up struggling, tried the steam trick, cool air trick, drinking water, and about 7 am I gave up and woke him. Now, I had been in and out of bed and the room repeatedly so he was half awake and knew something was up, but man did he panic when I said get up and go get public safety.

He hopped up so fast like "are you ok? will you be ok? don't die ok?" And I'm like, I'm not gonna die, please calm down, I been alive these last three hours haven't I? He knows that I'm not the healthiest person ever, but he doesn't really "get" my asthma. His brother had mild asthma and is healthy now, he doesn't know what to do with himself with my asthma. I gave him very specific instructions and things to tell public safety. I was doing so much calming and reassuring XD

I'm the one going to the hospital and I am so not panicking. We had a nice conversation with the school paramedic while waiting for the ambulance. The paramedic had an asthmatic brother and gave Boyfriend a lot of information and reassurance. I was still reassuring him in the hospital cuz he was blaming himself. He was all "I knew you didn't have an inhaler and I knew you shouldn't have been walking out in the cold air and uphill at that and so fast" and and and. I'm like, please, I chose to do those things and I chose to ignore my warning signs and I chose to push my luck. It's not your fault I'm here.

I already told you how he was so curious about my inhaler and getting to PRESSDEBUTTON! Every now and then I tell him a sign that my asthma is flaring, like me scratching and rubbing my throat. I don't think he recognizes a wheeze yet. Three years and it's amazing how much info giving you still have to do. I appreciate that he cares so much though, I still have to resist the urge to laugh when he panics and runs around like a chicken with its head cut off like I'll pass out and die in thirty seconds of telling him my asthma is flaring. I tell him that and he automatically tells me to rest/sit down/slow down/go home lol

But to be fair, he's only ever been to the ER a couple times in his life for himself (like, literally like four times, what a dream), and any other time it's been for a family member who's life is threatened severely. So, it stands to reason that he would be truly frightened to take me there, for not being able to breathe no less. I'm glad he's never seen me in one of those attacks that scare even me. He's very afraid of death and abandonment too, so yeah, girlfriend saying she needs an ambulance equals ultimate panic. Did I mention he and his track team self bolted to public safety and back in five minutes? I barely had time to call my mom and get dressed.
Finding the Secret Places This is my new blog

Tags:
 

Related Topics

  Subject / Started by Replies Last post
13 Replies
6376 Views
Last post February 09, 2013, 10:36:10 am
by Sophia C
7 Replies
5315 Views
Last post August 09, 2013, 04:37:59 pm
by Jenett
4 Replies
1640 Views
Last post January 17, 2014, 02:56:28 am
by Sophia C
31 Replies
8973 Views
Last post March 12, 2017, 08:50:58 pm
by Alexeigynaix
14 Replies
3285 Views
Last post April 17, 2017, 06:52:52 am
by PerditaPickle

Special Interest Group

Warning: You are currently in a Special Interest Group on the message board with special rules and focused discussions.

* Who's Online

  • Dot Guests: 203
  • Dot Hidden: 0
  • Dot Users: 0

There aren't any users online.

* Please Donate!

The Cauldron's server is expensive and requires monthly payments. Please become a Bronze, Silver or Gold Donor if you can. Donations are needed every month. Without member support, we can't afford the server.

* Shop & Support TC

The links below are affiliate links. When you click on one of these links you will go to the listed shopping site with The Cauldron's affiliate code. Any purchases you make during your visit will earn TC a tiny percentage of your purchase price at no extra cost to you.

* In Memoriam

Chavi (2006)
Elspeth (2010)
Marilyn (2013)

* Cauldron Staff

Host:
Sunflower

Message Board Staff
Board Coordinator:
Darkhawk

Assistant Board Coordinator:
Aster Breo

Senior Staff:
Aisling, Allaya, Jenett, Sefiru

Staff:
Ashmire, EclecticWheel, HarpingHawke, Kylara, PerditaPickle, rocquelaire

Discord Chat Staff
Chat Coordinator:
Morag

'Up All Night' Coordinator:
Altair

Cauldron Council:
Bob, Catja, Chatelaine, Emma-Eldritch, Fausta, Jubes, Kelly, LyricFox, Phouka, Sperran, Star, Steve, Tana

Site Administrator:
Randall

SimplePortal 2.3.6 © 2008-2014, SimplePortal