Asthmatics *wheeze* represent!!

http://www.buteyko.com/
http://www.buteyko.com.au/

"This is 'quack' cure! How can you claim that simple breathing techniques can help such serious illness when even modern medicine fails? I do not trust you, you are not serious!"

I carry a Ventolin inhaler with me at all times, but I can't use those preventative ones such as Becotide because they make me lose my voice which is a bit inconvenient (though my Other Half thinks it's quite good when that happens).

I recently bought that Buteyko system, and although it's very early days of practising the breathing exercises, it really *does* seem to be making a difference. I'm impressed with it so far, but you need to do the exercises several times a day and I don't always remember. It should be my New Year's Resolution to persevere with that, I think.

spinhalers are definitely the funnest.

No health insurance is a bitch, I'd like to figure out why my sinuses are so sensitive, and see if fixing that would clear up the ashtma again.

http://www.funhaler.com/gif/FUNbest.jpg

Do they just sell them at medical supply places? I couldn't find them at Eckerds or Walgreens.

(always had asthsma as a kid... still can't spell the damn word)

For several years of my life (and bear in mind I'm a man with a 40" chest, and I'm talking about when I was in my 20s), my peak flow was generally around 350 - a 400 was a really good day.

It arrived from a medical manufacturer called Monaghan Medical in Plattsburgh NY, phone 518-516-7330. might be worth a call if you really can't find it anywhere else.

I have also found that smoking just a small amount of weed during a chest cold dilates the lungs among other things.

I've been having breathing problems on and off for a long time now, kind of in concurrence with really bad sinus problems and other shit I've probably bored ILX to death posting about.

Usually my problems are just nose breathing but I do suffer in varying degrees of severity from tightness around my chest, it's very disconcerting and I get kind of butterflies in my stomach sometimes as a result.

My problem is I sort of assume that if I was asthmatic my Dr or the allergist I went to see would have told me by now. The only time I ever blew into anything that might have been a peak flow test, was when I was admitted to hospital on a precaution last July, when I first got sick.

So since then I've wondered are my problems anxiety related. I kind of alternate from being dubious about this to believing it. Dubious because I know I don't have actual mental anxiety problems, or at least I don't feel as though I do (only thing worrying me is being sick).

I was prescribed Xanax for anxiety and I find it does help my breathing to feel easier sometimes, but then would it just override an actual problem like mild asthma to a certain extent?

Are there any specific ways asthma feels that I should know or is it very different from person to person?

and i would see a doctor, just to put your mind at ease.

I would seek more opinions Ronan.

Inhalers I have had:

Spinhaler; mine was Intal iirc and not Ventolin - it was bloody useless and it felt like I was breathing in brick dust. I discard it...

Ventolin; the old grey/blue one, the original and still the best.

Becotide; I think it was called that, anyway it's the one with the steroids in. Did me no good whatsover.

I still suffer but now only when I have a chest cold (nerves don't help either). When it get really bad I get out of breath from simply getting out of a chair. The year before last - when I contracted a 300lb gorilla of a chest cold - I woke up in the middle of one night thinking that the whistling of a gale outside had disturbed me...turns out it was my own breathing.

I was half tempted to borrow a friends inhaler for a few days and see if it works, though I'm not sure the "if this works I am suffering from that" medical theory is a sound one!

I've seen 2 different GPs, and one doctor in hospital in the last 6 months but neither has really come out and suggested asthma, or even mentioned it at any point.

I had a full allergy test too and came up negative.

I was going to suggest this. I don't think it'll kill you or anything.

I never have had a serious attack, just a really heavy chested feeling quite alot, lasting for a few hours a day, for maybe a week or two, then kind of going away again for a while. Mainly just feels like I can't breath deeply enough. Also I seldom have wheezing, occasionally barely noticeable wheezing but more often really bad catarrh and phlegm in the back of my throat.

From talking to friends it seems asthma comes in alot of different varieties, have to say I will feel seriously cheated if I am diagnosed with asthma 7 months after first getting sick, and this is the main problem I've been having! Though it's highly possible I was asked in hospital "do you have any history of asthma" and just said "no", and everyone seems to say a one off peak flow test isn't sufficient.

which wz a clear liquid except it went "bad" = dark brown if you kept it too long

you put it in an old fashioned glass inhaler (actually mine wasn't very like that -- it wz smaller and simpler -- but inside the glass bit wz very elaborate...

it made yr lungs feel all squishy, it wz a nice feeling actually

(i still sometimes find intal spinhaler capsules down behind drawers -- wasn't this the one invented by roger out of swallows and amazons?)

i've had it since before they were born so i tend not to bother to respond to that -- but anyway, do you get short of breath from running for a bus? cz it's the way the teenage doctors can tell i'm not making up that i have asthma