Saturday 18 May 2013

Better

So now I have an industrial-strength inhaler that helps me breathe and not to wake myself up with broken accordion noises.  And the amitryptiline that keeps the wings in my head relatively level.  And the sumatriptan for when it threatens to implode in spectacular pain.  Once I was a person in blithe good health; now it seems I am mainly pit-props.

The asthma testing involved more TARDIS-looking equipment.  It turns out I have asthma and an allergy to "some trees".  This was something of a relief as I have googlitis from looking up the various deaths that start with not breathing very well. 

How do you know when you are ok?  Good health is not just the absence of illness.  But keeping everything at bay gives you the breathing space (ha!) to ponder that life might sort of feel all right.  Listening to Allegri's Miserere with that high, high C that sweeps the top of your head like a searchlight, it feels all right.  I don't even mind that Winter is sitting like a cuckoo in the middle of May.

So that's a start.  It may take a lifetime of pharmaceutical propping for this lifetime to be ok.  But that's all right.  That high C, by the way, was improvised.  Much like life.





2 comments:

  1. Pondering life...and health, fitness and sickness....and the alternative to it all is pretty heavy stuff. My recent ( although it's been going on for what seems for ever) illness...and now, remission, for however long ( my intention is for a very very long remission)has given me many sleepless nights. What I'm holding onto is that life can be so good, it is worth staying around for....and fighting to be as fit as possible in order to ward off sickness is so important. Thinking of you....hoping you get the balance right. Jx

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  2. I feel for you, ill health is no joke. Hope the meds allow you to get out in the fresh air, when the good weather finally arrives and blow some of winter's malaise away.

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