Slowly Choking

Ever had someone keep their hand on your windpipe all day and all night? Ever feel that hand start to close around your throat on its own whim, a little bit at a time, at random intervals, for anywhere between a few minutes to a few hours? Unless you're an asthmatic, you probably can't relate to this. I'm from Brampton, a place that used to be well-known for its quarries and terrible air quality (now it's known for heavy urbanization and massive influx of immigrants of a particular ethnicity). It was no surprise to my family when I was first diagnosed with asthma at the tender age of twelve. It sure as hell was a surprise to me.

I used to have a bad history of bronchitis. Between 10 and 12 years old, it got really bad. I would wheeze, get short of breath, and cough like the dickens. There was something about it that was just plain worse than the bronchitis I had dealt with for most of my life. We went to the doctors and I was given two puffers, regular scheduled visits with a breathing doctor, and the expectation that everything would be "all right" in a little while. The puffers helped; it's what they're designed to do. But I noticed that if I stopped taking the puffers, it would get worse. When I finally asked my parents about this when I was thirteen, they looked at me funny, as if I was supposed to know that asthma isn't a disease that just goes away. I was fucking thirteen. No one had told me 'til then that I'd spend the rest of my life as an asthmatic.

That pretty much put an end to my track & field pursuits; I already had respiratory problems due to a crooked nostril (something they never found out until they gave me a CAT scan when I was sixteen) and now I can't run more than a few paces before my lungs start to close, regardless of how many puffers I take. I still managed to stick with my karate training and earn my black belt, despite my asthma.

Things got a lot better when I went away to university in North Bay, Ontario. As the name implies, it's up north; far from the urbanized wastes of the Greater Toronto Area. Thus, it sports a superior air quality that I had never experienced before. For the five years I spent in the 'Bay, I rarely had a problem with my asthma, and could even stop taking my puffers for a time. It was beautiful, and if given the opportunity to move back there (or anywhere else north of there), I would take it in a heartbeat.

I would have happily stayed in North Bay if family issues had not called me back to Brampton. And here I've been, continuing to slowly choke on the air of a polluted, overcrowded cesspool. I've run out of asthma meds two months ago and have been sucking the fumes off my last puffer since. I've got no regular family doctor, and it's not like this stuff is available off-the-shelf at your local pharmacy (somebody please tell me why that is). Here's hoping the walk-in clinic today is nice enough to give me a prescription. I would very much like to breathe again.

FOLLOW-UP: The walk-in clinic was nice enough to renew my prescriptions, and I was able to acquire new puffers. I am breathing in a manner resembling normal now.