Breathing

[marydell]

Since all three members of my household are sick, and the other two are on antibiotics for nasty sinus and throat things, I figured I should go get my own sore throat and unhappy sinuses looked at.  Walgreens has a walk in clinic with a nurse practitioner, so I went there instead of to my regular doc...interesting results.  She said I have a sinus infection and gave me antibiotics, which was unsurprising. When she listened to my lungs she made me breathe out harder than I usually do for an exam, and of course I started coughing, because...well, I guess that's NOT normal, although it is normal for me.  If I take too deep of a breath, I cough.

So, it turns out that I know what a particular type of asthma attack feels like, and I have a "rescue" inhaler for that.  But this thing where I'm always a little winded? Is also asthma. Rather than merely being fat & out of shape, which is what I've been chalking it up to for, like, 3 years.  OH MY GOD. This shit could KILL ME and because I have the traditional American female body hatred I've been feeling bad about it and trying to lose weight and going running and crap (despite my lousy wind), but not actually TREATING the problem. ARGH

She gave me a 5-day course of prednisone (steroids) and said I should see my regular doctor about getting on a preventive/steroid inhaler.  Right now I'm sort of thinking, screw my regular doctor, since he didn't notice this, but of course doctoring isn't so different from what I do (computer support). If it's not happening at the time you're doing your tests & checks, there's no way to know that it happens when you're not looking...at least, not if your patient is making stupid body-hating assumptions about her symptoms.

Anyway I'm breathing better thanks to the steroids, I've got Plants vs. Zombies playing on my left-hand monitor and I'm watching Netflix on my right-hand monitor, and I have hopes of the antibiotics starting to clear everything up soon.  So, a better evening than I expected when I woke up this morning.

Comments

[fledgist.livejournal.com]

Oh dear. I'm glad you caught it. I hope this course of treatment can relieve the problem, and, I hope reverse it. If I may, perhaps you should ask your physician about sleep apnea. If you have a persistent sinus condition you may also have sleep apnea (when I was prescribed a c-pap machine to deal with the sleep apnea that was causing me to be drowsy half the day, my persistent sinus headaches, which had bothered me since childhood decreased significantly in frequency).

[marydell.livejournal.com]

I don't seem to have a sleep problem (although my husband does...can't get him to see a doc about it though, drat it, but I continue to toil away at wearing him down). We've just been handing this infection around the house for 3 months, and the other two folks keep taking antibiotics, and I keep taking OTC cold medicine. So I think I am patient zero at this point.

As I'm sure you'll recall, having very young children makes it impossible to handle germs properly, because when the baby wants to stick his hand in your mouth or to cough directly into your eyeball, there is no stopping him.

[fledgist.livejournal.com]

Ah, yes. All the fun of dealing with more colds.

If your husband is having sleep related problems then he should have a sleep study. If he has sleep apnea, and it's treated, he'll find that the number of minor infections (like colds) he gets will go down. Plus, he'll be a happier person. That will make you a happier person. Plus he'll look like something out of a pulp novel while he's sleeping.

[readinggeek451]

It's very good she caught it. I hope you (all) feel better soon.

[txanne.livejournal.com]

Oh dear. If only I'd known! This is what my asthma feels like, too. I'm on Singular nightly and an allergy pill (currently regular Allegra, which doesn't work nearly as well as Allegra-D). I was on Advair, too, but it messed with my voice, so I quit (and the New Reality's different allergens mean that it's okay).

::hugs::

[marydell.livejournal.com]

I've upgraded my antihistamine from benadryl to zyrtec, and that seems to be helping. I have to take the kids' dose or else my heart races--so it must be good! I'm going to talk to the doc about Singulair or Asmanex or something. Years ago I had a prescription for Seravent, just for when I had bronchitis. It seemed to help but recent studies show that it actually makes you more prone to die from an asthma attack. So I think I will probably not ask to take that one...

[etumukutenyak.livejournal.com]

Doctors can get tunnel vision, too, so having a new set of trained eyes on you was an excellent idea. Hope you continue to feel better!

[seawasp]

I've been an asthmatic for as long as I can remember (since I was 21 months old). Both of my sons have it.

It is an insidious and subtle disease in some forms, and it's missed just as easily in young children as in women.

My wife did not realize when my son Gabriel was really having a bad attack until he started going gray. (I would have known it at once, but it so happened this was on a day I was on travel). By the time he got to the ER, he was down 95% of his lung capacity.

Now that you know, take it seriously and treat it properly. Modern treatments can control it quite well.

[marydell.livejournal.com]

I apparently had it for my entire childhood, but it wasn't diagnosed, partly because I have "coughing asthma" instead of "wheezing asthma." Also because when I was a kid I didn't see the doctor as much as I probably should have. Unfortunately the habit of ignoring that stuff is really hard to unlearn, although fortunately I don't ignore any of it when it comes to my kid or my husband. Just...myself.

[haddayr.livejournal.com]

omg

I am so glad she caught this!

!!!

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Not yay asthma, obviously, but yay someone catching the existing asthma! That'll make such a difference.

[curmudgn]

Second what txanne said, but given what you say here and my own backstory (asthma since age 4, chronic/lifetime condition, no better than 75% PFR fully medicated), I'm gonna recommend never mind Singulair, go directly to Advair (tandem Flovent/Serevent), do not pass GO, do not collect $200. The tandem therapy avoids Serevent's unfortunate habit of killing the occasional patient when taken by itself. I've been on the stuff for years at scary-big doses (500/50; most common dose is 100/50), and the damn stuff does what it's supposed to do--suppresses asthma without all the crap side-effects that systemic steroids bring with them. (The main side effect is that the stuff's expensive like a mofo, and will continue to be until the patents finally run out.)

[marydell.livejournal.com]

I think my mom is on Advair - she has COPD/Emphysemia as well as asthma, whereas I mercifully don't. I'll have a look at it as well as Singulair and other stuff - since my problem is almost certainly allergy-exacerbated I need to make sure I manage the allergies as well as the specific asthma situation, and I think Singulair does both, somewhat. Also I'm already on a drug with a black-box osteoporosis warning, so that's another thing to weigh.

I'm very glad to hear that there's a thing that makes Serevent less killy, because I was on Serevent occasionally some years back and liked it quite a lot. So if it won't totally eat my bones it may be a good choice, unless it's overkill.