Gasping for Air

This constant fight to breathe, struggle, live, has gotten to me.

I know I should be grateful but it's hard to be grateful for something I feel I'm entitled to - air.

No one but a fellow asthmatic knows what it's like, the never ending quest for air, worry about how I'm going to pay for my next inhaler, despair over not being able to see the doctor because of money, the simple things non-asthmatics take for granted like anyone who doesn't suffer from this dreaded disease.

Sometimes I think it'd be easier just to give up or give in but I know with my luck I'll wind up a vegetable or something like it.

So I plod along but I'm tired, so tired. Tired of fighting, worrying, stressing over little things like am I going to wake up in the middle of the night, gasping for air or sick at my stomach? Am I going to be getting paid in time and will my check be enough to cover my inhalers that I go through lately like underwear because I can't shake this infection?

Please God, please, let this all be over soon. And I don't mean necessarily death, but a reprieve. Just a reprieve. My tears stuck in my throat like quicksand in my lungs.

I'd love to cry about all this but I know things could be worse, much worse. I don't feel entitled to cry over not being able to breathe.

There are so many people I know who have it so much worse than me and they don't complain - not to me anyway.

I should be grateful that though I just ran out of my inhaler I can breathe with my second breathing machine a friend bought me so I don't have to take an umpteenth trip to the ER.

I've lost friends because of this disease I've carried with me since age 12, one that really started doing its fancy footwork when I was in my 20s and admitted to the hospital for one of seven visits over many days, days that stretched into one another so before long it was all like one big Advent calendar, only with no end in sight.

Not inspired to do anything at this moment, I have figured out a way to do breathing treatments while I write. A gift, you could say. I used to try and meditate but would almost fall asleep.

I would lug my tired, achy body up from the covers of my bed, sleepily hook up my clumsy machine, which is now a nice, convenient purse-size thing, and slowly and methodically attach tube to tube, mouthpiece to part, piece by piece, pouring in the solution that will give me some relief.

Then, afterwards, I will pray for sleep and it will come, either briefly peacefully or quickly fitfully, but it does come eventually until I awaken again to do yet another breathing treatment.

I know all too well I could be sitting in the ER now at 2 a.m., and have, many times, praying, begging, wishing for quick relief, guilty about all the money I owe this hospital, yet not knowing what else to do.

The steroids I used to take gave me 60 more pounds on my once underweight frame and I no longer recognize myself. I, who used to be pretty and thin. I see myself in pictures now and hide them from sight, not wanting to see what I have become from sickness and depression.

Then there are the blues that come along with this asthma. I guess it is to be expected but when you're a manic-depressive, even more so.

My husband couldn't take taking care of me any more. When we dated he would spend the night in the hospital room. After we were married he'd look at me with contempt as I sat in the ER, breathing through a tube, his eyes glued to mine in utter coldness. Soon my knight in shining armor just wanted to know about the money, how much each procedure would cost, how we were going to pay. And while I understood his position, his change in attitude hurt. It hurt like no other hurt he ever inflicted on me, which was few. And our relationship changed after that.

I wonder if the tables were turned if I would have done the same.

I ask God to forgive my wicked thoughts against myself, against my tired, 38-year-old body that wants to do so much but can't.

I'm remembering how I used to be, how free, lively, spirited. The spirit is still there but the flesh is way weak.

My idea of heaven, if it does, in fact, exist, is to be able to breathe and run, and laugh, carefree, not worrying about where my next breath of air will come from, be it naturally or medicated.

It was never supposed to be this way. I had no idea. I always thought I was so invincible and now as I get older, I just get weaker, less motivated, and less strong.

Stay in the moment, I have heard. So for the moment I do breathe. Through this little miraculous contraption that is the great invention of modern medicine. Whoever invented it, I'd like to kiss them.

I have to stay focused, no matter what. I have to keep breathing till I can no longer breathe and God has decided to take me.

Until then I have to keep fighting, keep knowing that so far I guess I'm supposed to be here on this earth for whatever reason which has not been disclosed to me yet.

I want to tell all those people who can breathe so free, who don't have to worry about what's it like to not do so, that they are so lucky, that they need to grab life by the horns and run with it, run free, run far, and run fast.

Because but for the grace of God goes them.