Running Up That Hill

When I was in fifth grade and we ran the mile in PE, doing laps around orange cones in the field next to the school, I made it around once before my chest started to burn and the roots of my bottom teeth started to ache. I slowed to a jog, then a walk; finally I bent over, hands on knees, and gave up.

Our PE teacher seemed disappointed, although not surprised; if there was a volleyball flying through the air, it was sure to whack me in the head. On the other hand, if a softball came my way, I'd shy away and let it bounce off into right field. I was just...unathletic. Terribly out of shape. He shook his head in exasperation, and I felt guilty, but I just couldn't make my body run any more.

My cousins would come over to play, wanting to run up and down the creek bank, and I'd make up excuses, the most notable of which was that my bones were brittle and would shatter if I tried to run. That one prompted a call from my aunt to my mother. (We knew someone with osteogenesis imperfecta, so it wasn't like I'd made it up out of whole cloth.) I just didn't like running, I told my mom.

Sometimes doctors' kids get a trip to the pediatrician for every scrape, although most I've encountered are more like us, dependent on Dad bringing home a throat culture kit or writing a scrip for amoxicillin. Once, after a long bout of bronchitis, Dad brought me an albuterol inhaler. It felt wonderful, but after my cough was gone I lost it and never gave it another thought.

I never complained about the breathing because I never knew it was supposed to be different. I assumed I was out of shape and would always be, that this was some failing on my part that I would just have to accept. None of the adults in my life -- teachers, parents, the pediatrician we saw maybe once a year -- noticed anything amiss. I never had "asthma attacks" the way we think of them -- just couldn't run without that chest locking up.

When I was in my 20s, newly married and a few months away from figuring out (on my own) that I had PCOS, I decided I was going to get in shape. Walking was great, but I had to do it for an hour at a time to feel anything in my muscles. I tried rollerblading, but it was just like running: after five minutes my rib cage was aflame on the inside, my chin and teeth alternately itching and electric with shooting pains. About that time, I picked up a lingering cough, and instead of getting better it just got worse. Unable to lie down flat at night, and even propped upright barely able to breathe without hacking, I went to student health (Sean was a grad student at the time, and our insurance was...yeah).

After a listen to my chest and a brief interrogation, the NP determined that I had asthma and I'd had it for a long time. She set me up with a short-acting inhaler, a long-acting inhaler, and instructions to report to a pulmonologist for testing. After a twenty-minute session inside a weird vacuum-tube thing, it was determined that not only did I have asthma, but that my lungs had undergone remodeling -- permanent changes in function as a result of more than a decade of untreated asthma.

So. Now I have a maintenance medication, an albuterol inhaler, and I make sure to control my allergies. I don't even go into smoky bars, and I stay in on bad air days. But I was still dependent on walking and T-Tapp for exercise. And those things? Just were not cutting it. I needed to move fast. Something made me dig up DoctorMama's old posts about running, and damned if it wasn't finally time. My asthma is under control (although I pretreat with albuterol, every time). My worst foot problem has been surgically repaired; the lesser ones (osteochondral defect and weak ankles) improved enormously with frequent wearing of MBT shoes (really!). And, you know, shit. I'm 34 years old -- physiologically either on the plateau or the downslope depending on how you measure. If not now, when?

I'm not running to lose weight, oh no. If anything I'm running so I can eat a shit-ton of food and stay the same. I'm not running to look better in my clothes or maintain muscle mass or decrease disease risks. No, I'm running because if I don't get outside and move fast down the street and through the trees, under the sky and in the rain or the cold or the sun, my animal self will be lost. And that's the part of the brain, paradoxically, that keeps you sane.

I run slow. Probably comically slow. But if I keep my gaze off the ground I feel fleet and lithe. I don't feel angry any more that I was denied this experience for so long. I just feel grateful that I get to have it now.

 

 

Comments

[Heather]

Doctor Mama changed my life and after years I still run like a geriatric sloth but I LOVE it.

It is also pretty fun to be a relatively thin 37 year old and walk up behind the heavy 60 year old women and tell them I was chasing them for a whole 5k and couldn't catch them (because I really couldn't).

[Lilian]

Good for you!!!

Do you still take daily medication for asthma? The boys have been prescribed daily medication (steroids) and we're not very happy about it, but maybe it would be in their lungs' best interest. :( Kelvin is very asymptomatic, but he hates running and complains that he gets tired in PE all the time. Linton, on the other hand, has been taking Singulair daily for a year, and that doesn't seem to be enough, he's still wheezing daily on and off. The doctor prescribed a daily ihaled steroid for both of them (Flovent, I think). So, yeah... we have to get started, but we're hesitating.

Anyway, thinking that their lungs could be permanently damaged is NOT a good prospect, though. We'll research more and get them started soon.

P.S. Our student health insurance was really good at UMass. Particularly because it was completely free, covered by the grad student union. of course you can't choose doctors & stuff & I didn't care for my OBs (thankfully I got the births that I wanted), but the pediatrician was AWESOME! So... yeah, I miss the student health insurance. Our co-pays here in VA are SUPER high now. Total freedom to choose providers, which is good.

I actually miss the years of 100% covered CHIP for the boys.

[Jo]

Lilian, I take Pulmicort every day. The only reason it's Pulmicort and not Flovent (which it used to be) is that Pulmicort is pregnancy category B, Flovent is C. And now I have a hundred dollars' worth of the stuff to use up. :/

[Jo]

Also, remember that inhaled steroids are mostly locally active and pretty low in side effects. I have been using them consistently since I was 24 (omg 10 years) and have never noticed any ill effects -- not even an increase in respiratory infections (one possible risk, I guess due to local immunosuppression). Nothing systemic at all.

If it were my kid, I would use them -- my comfort level with them is very high -- but everyone's threshold is different! ;)

[Christy]

YES YES YES - this is TOTALLY me. I thought for years that it was "just me", that I happened to be more prone to chest colds; that it hurt EVERYONE to run and I was just kind of a wimp. I so completely understand and sympathize with you. Somehow or other age has improved things for me to the point where I don't actually have to take any maintenance medication most of the time (though I'm super vigilant about colds and things - any hint of ANYTHING and I'm back on them).

GOOD for you for not letting this stop you from running. I made the same decision a number of years ago - started with the couch to 5K plan and ended up running a half marathon. Then I had kids and this summer, after having Sam in June, started running again...verrrrry slowly but moving. Sam and I did the race for the cure in October (verrry slowly but you know what? We did it! Sam was no help - 3 month olds in strollers; kinda useless but you know - good for moral).

And I too TOTALLY run so that I can eat more ice cream. I think it's completely justified :).

[Lilian]

Thank you so much for commenting back. I grew up with awful asthma, since I was 3 years old... and there weren't these daily medications back then. (and I only took the emergency steroids until I was 5, then it was only albuterol & other treatments) The nebulizer was my best friend.

Anyhow, I'm obviously broken hearted that my sons inherited my asthma and I won't have any problem getting it treated -- provided it's safe.

My asthma and the awful allergic rhinitis that plagued my life during high school mostly went away after I became vegan when I was 19. I was pretty good at it for about ten years, but I've been back to dairy and eggs for 10 years. Sometimes I think that if I had been vegan during pregnancy and nursing years, the chances of the boys getting asthma might have been reduced. :( And then there was the cat that they are (or became) allergic too. Sigh. Now that we lost him, everyone says I can't have another cat because of their allergy. That totally breaks my heart. :(

oh, what an emotional or emoticon-laden comment!

[Jo]

Yeah, I should probably get allergy testing done -- I do remember my general asthma and allergies improving when I eliminated dairy and wheat for baby Sophia's eczema! And now I have eczema too. But cheese...so good...

The thinking on pet exposure in early life is that it can actually prevent allergies -- so maybe it would have been WORSE if you hadn't had a cat! I'm so sorry you can't have one now though. What about one of those gross hairless ones? ;)

[Brooke]

This is timely for me as well. I have had asthma since before I can remember. It's pretty bad on both sides of the family, so I couldn't avoid it really. Almost certainly passed it on to my son.

I'm on Alvesco right now. Or I should be, but it started giving my thrush. I am prone to thrush apparently. So, I need to call the allergist and find something else. Also, it's pricey, and the insurance probably won't allow it after the first of the year.

[Fakey]

I think my experience has been far less severs, but otherwise, I know exactly how you feel- I did ballet for years (there was some mildly heavy breathing and recovery at the end of class), but running the bases at kickball in gym class would end in a huge pain in my side. Any running or swimming or serious aerobic stuff did.

I was tested for asthma and allergies more than once. Nothing.

Things got better as I got older but then (at the age of 28) I almost passed out at a free trial Krav Maga class- seriously, things got blurry and dark and I had to sit down before I tipped over. Um, yeah, I have exercise-induced asthma. None of my childhood tests were any more strenuous than "sit here, blow here once, you're fine." So now I have a regular old albuterol inhaler that I use before exercising and maybe once a week in the winter.

Last Spring, after reading Doctor Mama's maggot series for the 8th time, I said fuck it and started couch to 5k. I ran sloooow. I could run. And it was awesome.

Then I got pregnant and nauseous and had to stop. But I am already looking forward to running again after the baby's born. Yay running!

[Tine]

It makes me smile that you've found you can run, and that it's making you so happy. That's really, really cool.

[birdie]

We run, not because we think it is doing us good, but because we enjoy it and cannot help ourselves.

-Sir Roger Bannister

From one badass mother runner to another, have fun!!

[Micaela]

I love the Sir Roger Bannister quote.

And yes!

[SarcastiCarrie]

I did couch to 5k this year. I'm 34. I had never run a mile (let alone 3) before in my life. I ran my first 5k on 9/11 and my second on 10/30. I run slowly. People who walk some of the race finish before I do. But I run the whole way.

I go out at night after the kids are in bed. I wear a dorky little light on my rear end so cars don't hit me.

[sel]

"No, I'm running because if I don't get outside and move fast down the street and through the trees, under the sky and in the rain or the cold or the sun, my animal self will be lost. And that's the part of the brain, paradoxically, that keeps you sane."

What a great description of the motivation to run! And I'm feeling that absence acutely right now, until my right hip learns to behave. (I'm hoping steroids will do the trick.) Also, SO SAD as a former respiratory therapist to hear about the undiagnosed asthma. It's so treatable...