Asthma is more than just an “Asthma Attack”

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You’ve heard the words “asthma attack”, “asthma flare”, or “asthma exacerbation” etc, used to describe asthma when it’s at it’s worst. These terms convey a sense of suddenness, of urgency, of intensity or escalation and loss of control of one’s asthma symptoms. And rightfully so, asthma attacks can be life-threatening and are scary as hell when they happen. But those same words also denote a sense of temporariness, of something that’s fleeting in nature, that the bad part will eventually pass. It’s like you’re cruising along and then you have a bad attack and get you get better and everything is hunky dory. That’s just the episodic nature of asthma, right? Well, not exactly. And that’s what makes talking about asthma so confusing, or should I say misleading.

While the really bad attack gets all the attention and often dramatizes the disease, most asthmatics suffer in between attacks as well and usually to a greater degree. It’s not as if the airways go from a totally obstructed state during an asthma attack, to a totally open one afterwards. The smooth muscle that surrounds the breathing tubes will eventually relax and allow for easier breathing after the attack eases, but there’s usually some degree of inflammation/obstruction present in asthmatic lungs all the time. You might be breathing better after a really bad attack, but as an asthmatic you’re still going to experience some degree of breathlessness even when the attack phase is over. And that’s the whole point of this short article. Asthmatics are usually symptomatic even they’re NOT actively flaring, and the #1 symptom that asthmatics experience (or a person with any other obstructive lung disease for that matter), is shortness of breath or difficult breathing. The feeling of suffocation might not be as intense as during a severe flare, but it’s still very uncomfortable and quite stressful. If you’ve never experienced what it feels like to be constantly short of breath or to have work really hard for every breath you take, trust me, it’s a form of suffering like no other. More akin to torture actually.

Asthma is not just about the periodic “Asthma Attack” or sudden flare up as is so often portrayed in social and other media. If that were the case it would be a much easier condition to live with. No, asthma is a full-time disease that cycles from really bad to not so bad, to the occasional good day. For some, it means living behind a nebulizer and taking powerful side-effect ridden medications.It means proceeding with caution in everything you do to keep symptoms at a tolerable level. It’s means dealing with fluctuating degrees of breathlessness, sometimes on a daily basis. It’s a disease that causes suffering even when the person is not having a full on “Asthma Attack”.

So no, asthma is not just an intermittent, occasionally serious lung disorder. It’s a chronic, debilitating and way too often deadly disease that causes untold suffering for millions of people, every single minute of every single day everywhere in the world. It’s a disease that costs billions medical treatment and missed school, work days and still the suffering continues. We need to take a closer look at how this disease impacts it victims on a day to day basis and find a way to reduce this suffering.

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