About two weeks back I landed myself a sore throat. Nothing that couldn’t be cured by warm water gargles and mugs of ginger tea, I thought. However within a day my throat turned to sandpaper making swallowing difficult and I felt The Wheeze come on.
If you’ve ever had it you’ll understand the capitals. Within the space of a day breathing becomes a chore, lying down impossible and sleep a mere dream.
This hadn’t happened to me in the last ten years. The twins seemed to have scared it away! However this time it was back.
I gave up oral medications and took on inhalers. Soon enough the breathing eased. Within a week I was feeling human again.
I remembered my childhood – those long painful nights with my mum sitting beside me rubbing warm mustard oil and garlic on my chest while I struggled for each breath and prayed for the night to be over. The days weren’t ever so bad for there were distractions. Nights, on the other hand, were dreaded monsters. Propped up by pillows I would struggle to pull out each breath from my clogged lungs.
Those nights were truly dreadful.
It was this dread that made me reach out for shawls and sweaters at parties. This dread made sure I was always unfashionably bundled up at weddings and get-togethers when everyone else was flaunting their silks and georgettes. And it was this dread that made me completely immune to friendly jibes from friends and family.
It would take sometimes, a month for the congestion to go.
This gratitude post today goes out to scientists, researchers and doctors who have made our lives so much easier that a mere ten days later I was back at my Zumba class with just a memory of the wheeze.
Thank you with all my heart. Oh and from my lungs too :-).
Linking up to Vidya’s Gratitude Circle Blog Hop. Do click on the link and head on over.
