Asthma is a chronic lung condition that makes your lungs more sensitive to certain factors then other people's lungs. This is a disease that is always with you, even on those days when your body does not show any symptoms. The airways (bronchioles) in your lungs are senstive to things in the air and they will react to them and become irritated. When the airways get irritated, the lining can become inflamed, thickened and swollen and the muscles the surround the airways can spasm or squeeze the airways and then mucus can become thicker then it normally is. When these things happen, there is less room in the airways for air to flow through to and from your lungs. This can make trying to breathe a nightmare, and sometimes impossible to do.
The most common first sign of asthma is a cough, especially when this occurs with exercise or at night. Many patients also experience a wheezing noise, a feeling of tightness in the chest, or some difficulty breathing. What happens is that the airways get tight from spasms and mucous thickening and it makes it hard for the air to travel through, which can cause a whistling or wheezing sound. The person with asthma will try to cough to clear their lungs which causes pain in the chest along with the pain caused by the spasms. It can also cause the person to become even more short of breath and make their chest tighten even more...its a vicious cycle.
Exertion (especially running), colds and other viral infections, and simply lying down at night are the three most common triggers of asthma symptoms. But asthma can be triggered by a many other factors, allergens such as pollens, molds, animal dander, house dust mites and other things such as sinus infections, air pollution, weather changes (especially cold air), tobacco or wood smoke, chemicals, strong odors, foods, and even, at times, stressful situations. Sensitivities to medications such as aspirin, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (ibuprofen/Advil, naproxen/Naprosyn), or sulfites, or the use of beta-blocker heart medicines (Inderal, Corgard, Lopressor, Tenormin) can sometimes result in asthmatic symptoms. Gastroesophageal reflux, where stomach acids can reflux back into the esophagus, can cause heartburn and increase asthma symptoms, especially at night. Occupational exposure to chemicals or other irritants at work can be triggering factors for asthma episodes.
I was not diagnosed as having asthma until I was 18 years old. I had pneumonia as a small child and seemed to have one bout of bronchitis after the other while growing up, but I never really had what could be termed an asthma attack until I was 18. I was in Florida in the summer time and it was very hot and humid...and I was foolishly running an obstacle course. Suddenly my chest hurt and I felt like I was drowning! I couldn't take in a breath! It scared me to death which only made it worse. I was rushed to a hospital and had to spend a few days there until I could breathe easily again. That's when I found out I had a disease that would last a lifetime. There is no cure, and until recently there wasn't a whole lot they could do to prevent an asthma attack from happening. Even now, with the new drugs they are creating, they have discovered that they do not work for everyone and the cost of some of the new drugs is so prohibitive that many people cannot afford to buy them. When asthma occurs in childhood, sometimes a child can outgrow the symtoms, but not always. When the onset of asthma comes in your adulthood, it never goes away. At first my asthma was considered "acute". In other words, I would have some nasty asthma attacks, but they were very rare. I could go for a few years without ever having one. But as I grew older and took more and more medications for infertility, I became more vulnerable to asthma attacks, and mine is now considered to be acute AND chronic. An immunologist at a large medical center, also discovered that I have almost none of a particular antibody that helps to fight infections in the mucous membranes of the body and this leaves me particularly vulnerable to infections and asthma irritants. Most of the time I can control it with medications, but the medications themselves can cause some adverse reactions in the body, especially prednesone, which is a steroid that is commonly prescribed for asthmatics. I have a little machine at home that I can use with a liquid medication and it has helped a whole lot and kept the hospital visits to a minimum in the last few years. And fortunately these days, I am much more calm and relaxed and tend to have lots fewer asthma attacks then I used to.
 Email Ms Jasmin
 visitor to this site since July 20, 1998.
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