My Life as an Asthma Mom

  In keeping with Spending Holidays Alone This Year, we will be having a very small Thanksgiving. There will only be 4 of us, and we are all staying here at the house. It seems like it's an awful lot of work for me to cook an entire Thanksgiving dinner for 4 people. Whether you cook for 4 or 20, it's the same amount of side dishes. And not that much work for me to cook for a bigger crowd. A friend mentioned that she ordered a catered dinner through a local restaurant. Hmmm. Tempting.  But..... We have food allergies. And it's hard to trust anyone else to cook your food and be careful about food allergies.  Like most people with asthma, we also have environmental allergies (dogs, cats, trees, flowers, dust, etc.) And just for fun -  Son #2 and I also have food allergies.  Which makes it a little nerve wracking when we get take out (or the neighbors drop something off.) It's not that we don't trust people. It's just that we don't trust people! For people who d

                                                                             I was listening to a hoarding webinar from the Mental Health Association of San Fransisco, and learned so much! Did you know that hoarding is also known as  "collecting behavior"? Interesting - but what does this have to do with asthma? Mental Health Association of San Fransisco lists problems with having too much clutter: Safety Hazards  It can be hard to navigate around piles of belongings and can cause tripping and falling. This can be even harder if someone is disabled or elderly. Health Hazards Piles of belongings means people won't be able to clean well. That can lead to rotting food (and can also lead to mold growth.) Reduced cleaning can also make allergies and asthma worse.  Fire Hazards Clutter can block doors and windows, which could make it dangerous to try to get out of a house. Boxes, papers, etc can quickly go up in flames Worried that you or someone you love may have a problem? Y

  I think most people have heard of or know what PTSD is -  but for those who don't, Mayo Clinic describes it this way: "Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a mental health condition that's triggered by a terrifying event — either experiencing it or witnessing it. Symptoms may include flashbacks, nightmares and severe anxiety, as well as uncontrollable thoughts about the event."  How can you get PTSD from asthma?  Well, for those of us with asthma, not being able to breathe is a terrifying event! Over the last 20 years, we have had our share of traumatic events. Daughter Kitty and Son #2 were in the hospital 12 times for asthma - and two of those were ICU! When you see the hospital staff panicking trying to take care of your child, you panic! Most of the hospitalizations for my kids were caused by pneumonia, but there was an ICU admission for Son #2 due to smoke from a nearby forest fire. No matter what I did, nothing helped him. Breathing treatments weren'