From the Archives
  • I look too Healthy

    I look too Healthy

    I get this all the time......... "You look so healthy" "You don't look like you have a disability" "You can walk farther then I can" "You look amazingly fit for someone with severe asthma" "You make marathon walking look so easy", and so ...

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  • Double Whammy Asthma

    Double Whammy Asthma

    I often find it frustrating that here I am, a life long asthmatic, a Respiratory therapist and an asthma educator, yet still unable in normal conversation, to describe what makes my type of asthma so different from others. When asked to define asthma in general, I usually give the ...

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  • I’m a recovering  Albuter-holic

    I'm a recovering Albuter-holic

    Rick, the author of the Respiratory Therapy Cave , wrote to me the other day talking about what it was like growing up with severe asthma. One of the things he mentioned that I thought was kinda funny, was how he used to sleep with an inhaler ...

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  • Asthma guilt trip

    Asthma guilt trip

    How many times have you had a really bad asthma flare, but had serious trepidations about going to the emergency room for treatment? How many times have you felt guilty that maybe you weren't sick enough to be admitted to the hospital? Well, that's pretty much been the ...

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  • Lung Lingo

    Yes it's true, we asthmatics have a language all our own.   Here's my current list. Please feel free to add new words and definitions to it .   Yellow Zoning When someone is stuck in their yellow breathing zone. Cradle Asthmatic A person who has had asthma since earlier childhood or ...

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  • Healing Walks

    Healing Walks

    Carolyn Scott Kortge's new book is finally out and guess who's in one of the chapters? Carolyn contacted me about year ago for this project. She thought I had an interesting story to tell, and that it would fit in nicely with the motivational theme of the book. It's really ...

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  • My New Old Passion

    My New Old Passion

    It's actually not a new passion, more like the reigniting of an on again, off again love affair Ive had since early childhood. I'm referring of course to the bass guitar, or for that matter any other heavy string instrument. My introduction into the world of making music actually ...

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  • Boston 2011 Race Report

    Boston 2011 Race Report

    They don't call it the best marathon in the world for nothing , and this year was no exception. The weather was near perfect and the spectators and volunteers outdid themselves. The moment I entered athletes village and the disabled athletes staging area early Monday morning, my worries and stress about ...

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  • Propofol

    Propofol

    This is a picture of me on a ventilator last year during a severe asthma exacerbation ( what they call status asthmaticus). See the little IV bottle inside the blue rectangle with the milky looking stuff inside ? That's Propofol ! Also known as ...

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  • The SARP experience

    The SARP experience

    Welcome to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania for the

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  • The Recuperative phases of a severe asthma exacerbation

    Suffice it to say, I wasn't exactly a happy camper when I wrote that Dr W helped me get through this awful time by reassuring me that what anguish I was experiencing was a normal response after suffering such a severe flare up, and that my complaints were ...

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  • Buried Alive

    Buried Alive

    The photo is from the movie "Awake" , but what happened to me last September was not fiction. It was the real deal. I'll share with you now, what I couldn't 9 months ago because of pending legal action. Ive since withdrawn my lawsuit against the parties involved and ...

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  • A quarter million puffs

    A quarter million puffs

    Care for some Albuterol? (Hey.....how did the primatine mist get in there?) I sometimes jokingly claim that Ive

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  • Questions for Dr. Wenzel

    Questions for Dr. Wenzel

    Last week after finding out just how damaged my lungs really are, the only thing going through my head was..WHY? All of the assumptions I had made about my asthma throughout the years, suddenly didn't seem to make sense anymore. I was beginning to wonder if ...

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  • Do you know when it’s time to go in?

    Do you know when it's time to go in?

    The idea for this post came to me during the middle a recent severe exacerbation. Actually, it was the same exacerbation that put me in the hospital for 12 days, for which I am still recovering. Foremost on my mind during one of these really bad flares is the ...

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  • 6 times a day

    I had planned to write a post about my nebulizer treatment routine, but then I thought....what the heck,  I'll just video it! Its  spontaneous , unedited and kinda lame, but it's the real deal and it's what I have to do at least 6 times a day. ( recorded on 1-28-2009) ...

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  • Asthma Breathing Zones

    Asthma Breathing Zones

    This is the 2nd installment of my " Breathing, the mini series". This one is more for the non-asthmatics out there, but I think some of our lung challenged friends might learn a thing or two as well. If you hang around asthmatics or browse as many personal asthma blogs ...

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  • #97 , misinformation and a virus from Hell

    #97 , misinformation and a virus from Hell

    Battle scars: 4 failed arterial line attempts and 12 failed IV attempts. I have no veins left and my radial arteries are so scarred up from previous insertions, that it's virtually impossible to get access unless they put a central line in. Very frustrating for the doctors and ...

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  • Multi-tasking

    Multi-tasking

    When you spend as much time behind a nebulizer as I do, you learn to put that time to good use. A back massage, reading a good

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halloween 2010 pumpkins 049
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And the Winner is ……

Thanks everyone for making this a fun contest and thank you Microlife for donating the awesome pf meter. I wish I had prizes for everyone. Some of you came very close, but there can be only one winner, and that is (drum roll please)…….Kris of Ontario, Canada. Congrats Kris! Kris came the closest with her [...]

October 29, 2010 6
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Alfie’s Attack

Meet Alfie the fish…. When the publishers of this new childrens book about asthma sent me a copy for my opinions, I wasn’t sure if I would be able to give it a fair review. I mean, an asthmatic fish who saves the live of shark who also has asthma? My background as Respiratory Therapist [...]

October 24, 2010 6
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It’s been a rough couple of months

October has traditionally been a bad month for my asthma (and I’m sure I’m not alone on that), but this is the first time Ive been sick for most of September as well. No doubt about it… this has been a humdinger of a flare. Ive been out of the hospital for an entire month [...]

October 19, 2010 4
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My first Halloween Contest

The following is a perfect example of what prednisone can to an otherwise intelligent and creative mind…… I was at the town grocery store the other day, where I noticed they were having a contest to see if you could guess the weight of this huge pumpkin they had as part of a Halloween display. [...]

October 12, 2010 22
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Considering BT ?

As this new treatment for severe asthma becomes more readily available to the general public, I think it’s important that prospective patients arm themselves with as much information as they can about the procedure. A physician by the name Steve Gupta, a board certified internist and an allergy immunology specialist practicing in Southern California, has [...]

October 8, 2010 4
peakflowmeters
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Asthma Breathing Zones

This is the 2nd installment of my “ Breathing, the mini series“. This one is more for the non-asthmatics out there, but I think some of our lung challenged friends might learn a thing or two as well. If you hang around asthmatics or browse as many personal asthma blogs as much as I do, [...]

September 29, 2010 18
UrbanCow no
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No Cowbells for Stephen

You train hard and wait months in anticipation to accomplish a goal you’ve been aiming for, and then BAM! ….in a matter of hours, a severe

September 26, 2010 14
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Running on empty

I actually had something else prepared for this weeks post, but since there’s a good chance I’ll be heading to the slammer shortly, I thought Id do a quick update on what’s been happening. If you’ve been watching my sidebar lately you probably noticed that my numbers have been all over the place. Ive been [...]

September 13, 2010 6
operation self-esteem
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Asthma guilt trip

How many times have you had a really bad asthma flare, but had serious trepidations about going to the emergency room for treatment? How many times have you felt guilty that maybe you weren’t sick enough to be admitted to the hospital? Well, that’s pretty much been the case for me for as long as [...]

September 7, 2010 21
walk 003
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Evening walks.

Heading out for the evening walk. A while back I wrote about some of the night walks we were doing . Well, my partner Douglas liked those night time walks so much , that about 3 weeks ago we started doing something similar on a nightly basis. No, I’m not trying to turn Douglas into [...]

August 31, 2010 6
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Breathing……the mini series.

I thought Id do something a little different with today’s post and teach some Respiratory Therapy 101 to my fellow asthmatics . A mini series if you will, on topics that I think every asthmatic should be familiar with. Things like.. Dyspnea, what exactly is it? Or, Air-trapping? Or how about, Obstructive lung disease..what is [...]

August 27, 2010 5
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When the Cows come home

…….Yeah, that’s just about the time I’ll be crossing the finish line at my next race. For my October race choice, Ive decided to go with the Urban Cow Half marathon, Relay and 5K race. Held in an area near the state capital of California in Sacramento, the Urban Cow marathon looks like a fun [...]

August 24, 2010 2
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Going to Paris this weekend

Don’t I wish……. Actually, I’m going to the Paris Hotel in Las Vegas . I’m finally following through on one of the promises I made to myself the last time I got out of prison, which was to treat myself to a Barry Manilow show if I survived. No front row seats for me this [...]

August 19, 2010 4
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