I'll huff and I'll puff (My Experience of Asthma)

Member Name: Scooobydooo

Product:	My Experience of Asthma
Date:	09/03/04 (106 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: none

Disadvantages: breathing problems

Since starting work, my asthma has decided to kick off, due to all the dust, it has continually got worst to the point where I have had to go back to the doctors.

Now I am not one to go yapping to the doctor with all my disabilities, but I also am quite aware that this can also kill you. I used to be terrible for not taking my inhalers with me, until a young girl of my age forgot her inhaler and died. This brought it home to me how serious this can be if you do not pay it the respects it deserves.

Up until 10 years ago, I was known as the Reebok kid as I would not wear anything unless it had this on. I went to the gym at least 10 times a week and was in peak fitness, yes I did smoke and this was one of the problems that I had to address but it never caused me any problems.

10 years on with one kidney, Osteoarthritis and infections and asthma, my life has totally changed. No longer can I go to the gym. I would be huffing and puffing more than Thomas the Tank Engine.

So why and how did I get asthma? Well it was over 7 years ago when everyone was suffering from a flu bug. Likewise I was no exception but after wards when I was recovering, something did not seem quite right and off back to the doctors I travelled. He told he I had got a mild form of asthma and with careful treatment it should go as quick as it comes.

The definition of Asthma is that it causes difficulty when you are trying to breathe and this can take on recognisable symptoms as wheezing and gasping for air. To see how it feels to struggle to breathe, try this, take a nice long deep breath. Easy isn’t it ? as we all take this for granted. Now take a very short breath and compare how fast you start to breath, right stop. This is how it affects people not been able to breath deeply and normally as the narrowin
g of the air passages are closing in. It can also be due to mucus that is blocking the airways, so once again it becomes hard to breathe.

I could be out shopping and silly things like carrying too much shopping that puts pressure on my large frame can activate it, just a bit like huffing and puffing at first and then I can feel my chest tightening. At this point I have to stop and search for my asthma sprays, the blue one, (I will go into the types of sprays later on). A couple of quick blasts on this and it soon returns to normal and I start to enjoy the fresh air.

After realising a couple of years ago that this asthma was not going to settle down, I returned back to the doctor and he put me on another inhaler, colour co-ordinated inhalers now. Time went on and again I found myself at the doctors once again and he gave me another inhaler. So now my inhalers were three, Salbutamol and a preventer and a steroid. I found these were a pain to take out and quite stupidly I started to leave them at home thinking I did not need them. Then one night I had gone out with the girls and the pub was smokey and they opened the windows for me. However I could feel an attack come on and decided to get home. I went out of the pub and was gasping for air. My brain was saying breathe, inhale, breathe, inhale, yet my asthma was saying puff, puff, puff, wheeze, wheeze, wheeze… I managed to get to the end of the road and which point I was felt as though I was going to die through not breathing. I quickly searched my bags and found the sprays were not there.

I had my mobile phone on me and I rang my husband and huffed and puffed and he knew what was wrong. Now luckily he knew I had left them at home and he also knew exactly what way I would be coming home and he set off to my rescue. He found me and he was quite scared and
said let’s get home and get an ambulance and not wanting to waste a hospitals time and effort I declined. It took hours for the asthma to calm down and I took a peak flow reading and went to my doctors the next morning. At this point the doctors face went white. He said I should have gone straight to the hospital as I could have died. As I was a bit naive about asthma and did not know much more that that I had it, I decided to find out more.

People with asthma are usually give the puff inhaler spray and this is blue, by pressing once or twice on the spray it releases Salbutamol into your body which should open up the airways allowing you to breathing. When having a full-blown asthma attack, your heart is thumping and you are gasping for air, it is important at this stage to try and not panic as this makes it a lot worse. This is referred to as a reliever.

Now in our body we have something called hydro-cortisone, I have this as a preventer and it works slowly I take this a couple of times a day to prevent an attack.

I also have a steroid inhaler, which is also a preventer, and this is also taken everyday to try and prevent the attack.

I have had times when none of my sprays have helped and I have been put on really strong steroid tablets, even with the fear of turning into a man over night, I took them and my doctor assured me that at the end of the course, I would still have my womanly bits, but this is a quick 7 day course to bring it back under control.

Most people who go on to have asthma will have both of these and children some times find inhalers a problem so if they cannot use them, they can have spacers which is a plastic tube where the spray is sprayed into and the child has the other end in its mouth and inhales. Now you can also get these in adult form.

However I could never come to
grip with the sprays into your mouth and they started to make me feel sick so I never used them, until I had a serious attack, which was silly. I returned back to my doctor and now I have Accuinhalers which are round and you have 52 doses in each one and you twist it round and inhale, much easier and you know you have had the correct dose.

Asthma is getting more commoner in children and some are lucky and do grow out of it. Adults can just get it like that, one month I was ok and the next I could not breathe and I have had it know for seven years.

Normally when you have asthma, you are given a peak flow, which is a tube that you blow into and this records what state your breathing is. I do this every morning and take readings, especially at the moment as I struggle to breathe.

They say asthma can be triggered by dust, environmental problems as petrol fumes and smoking and weight and exercise and dust. As today’s world is becoming rather a clogged up place, asthma will thrive and the problems on the NHS for this is great.

Now if you have got asthma, you have to look at your lifestyle and try and eliminate some of those problems. How does it affect you, it affects me a great deal at the moment as heat triggers my asthma off and if the bedroom is hot, I start to huff and puff and it is so uncomfortable to breathe. I always sleep with the window wide open and it was so severe last night I slept in the other bedroom as I was disturbing Mr Bubbles. During the night he got up and came to see how I was and shut the window as I was soaking wet with the wind and the rain blowing through but at least I could breathe. I love the cold weather and the fresh air but it also seems to start it off, especially around autumn when it is neither hot nor cold.

It also affects me in the way I cannot go t
o the gym anymore and this one time woman who was 11 stone went up to nearly 19 stone. Last year I embarked on a diet and lost just over 3.5 stone but I have put some back on and it has also made things worse, so back to Weightwatchers I have gone this week and I have started at 16stone 12lbs. I am 5ft 8 and of large build anyway and people never believe me when I tell them how much I weigh. I carry it well but neither does it do any good for any of my disabilities so it has to go. I miss my life of going to the gym as well. I would love to get it under control.

Now here is my advice on Asthma Tips
1) If you ever have problems breathing see your doctor.
2) Make sure you always have sprays handy, I have them in several places around the house.
3) If you are at school, make sure, your friends and teachers are made aware of it.
4) Teach your friends what they should do if you have an attack; it is no use giving you an inhaler that is to prevent an attack when you are having one.
5) If a person is having an asthma attack, look for the blue spray, salbutamol, ventalin, this is what will help them.
6) Check and monitor your asthma, one-day mine is fines, the next I cannot breathe.
7) If you have triggers like weight and smoking, do something about it; what is the point of doctors helping you if you don’t help yourself.
8) Do not be ashamed of it, respect it and deaths are rare, ignore it at your peril like I did and it could claim your life.
9) If you are in any doubt, and the sprays are not working, ring 999 as they can put you on stronger drugs. Also they can bring it under control easily. I wish I had done this when I had a bad attack as it nearly killed me and I was too embarrassed to ask for help.
10) If you’re a child with asthma, make your spray cool by adding stic
kers on the outside or on the outside of your spacer.
11)Never hid the fact that you have asthma, all my friends are aware and also know what happens and which sprays to use in case I have an attack and they know how many puffs to give me and also how long to wait if they are not working and what point to call 999.


Asthma is a horrible thing to have, you must respect it and work with it. Get the doctor for you to speak to the Asthma nurse who will tell you loads of things about it and little tips to help you keep it in control. My flare-up this time has lasted 3 weeks so far and I am back at the doctors this week to see if I have to go on the steroid tablets as it is been a bit naughty. One thing I have learnt from it is never to ignore it!

Even if you do not know anyone who asthma it is very handy to know what to do incase you meet some one who has an attack.

Hope this helps you all,

Karen

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