When Air Becomes More Precious Than Gold...

For the past week or more our house has sounded something like a dog pound. More than one member of the family has had minor respiratory problems for quite some time, but all of a sudden a nasty, persistent cough has hit everyone except my wife. I think I was the first, as my usual raw throat trouble started to be supplemented with occasional bursts of deep, chesty coughing about two weeks ago. My son, who has mild asthma, followed soon after. My daughter, who usually has no trouble at all, came last. My wife also has raw throat trouble, but thus far she seems to have been spared (and I really have to wonder why).

As usual, I stubbornly refused to see a doctor despite my wife's constant urging. I tend to shy away from hospitals and clinics unless absolutely necessary (which still means I tend to wind up visiting them at least twice a year), and a mere cough didn't qualify. After my kids' coughing lasted more than a week my wife finally took both of them to the hospital (last Monday). As is typical in this country, the doctor gave no explanation at all; he just wrote up a massive prescription for both kids and sent them on their way. Three days and several packs of medicine later, neither of the kids was showing any sign of improvement. I didn't bother saying, "I told you so," even though I seemed to be getting better.

At least that's what I thought.

At about 3:00 a.m. this morning I suddenly woke up and was immediately hit by an explosive fit of coughing. That wasn't so bad. When I finally stopped coughing, my throat seized up, cutting off my airway as if I were being strangled. In other words, I was unable to breathe. I've had this sort of thing happen before, but only for an instant, usually followed by another cough which clears it up. Well, another cough didn't come, and my throat stayed constricted. I jumped out of bed and ran downstairs, spots starting to play in my vision as I kept on desperately trying to draw a breath. My wife, who had fallen asleep downstairs in the middle of grading papers, woke up and had no idea what was going on. She thought I was trying not to puke, and all she did was fetch a large bowl from the kitchen and hold it under my mouth for me to heave in. I was totally unable to tell her that I was choking to death, and it simply didn't occur to her.

Ironically enough, I was apparently saved by a gas bubble. In my struggle to breathe I wound up coaxing out a belch, and that somehow opened my airway just enough for me to draw a quick breath and get out a few words before my throat seized up again. That was enough to let my wife know what was going on. She had already bought some face masks containing a decongestant for the kids. She slapped one of those over my mouth, and it did the trick. My throat quickly started opening again.

My wife was going to call an ambulance, but I refused. Instead, I left the mask on and went back to bed. Thankfully, I was able to sleep without incident. This morning both my wife and I took the day off from work, and she took me to the hospital. After a three-hour wait (ain't socialized medicine wonderful...and it's really only semi-socialized) I finally got to see a doctor. After checking me out, he said he was worried it might be either a mycoplasma infection (which is apparently going around now) or an onset of pneumonia, so I was sent to get an X-ray and a blood test. Then we had to wait more than an hour (during which time we had lunch), after which the doctor said he found no sign of anything particularly serious. Still, he was concerned that a bacteria (or mycoplasmal) infection might be possible, so he wrote me up a prescription and sent me on my merry way.

Well, I had a good rest at home, which I'm sure did me some good, but it also seriously screwed up my schedule at work. Oh, well. I'd say oxygen is far more crucial to me than my students' test scores...