Guest Blogger
Carolyn
My journey as the mother of asthmatic started just three months after my son Jack was born when he was diagnosed with asthma. Even though I have asthma myself, my own asthma hadn’t been diagnosed until I was well into my twenties so my own childhood asthma experience was very limited. Trying to hold the inhaler up to Jack’s tiny face, I had no idea what was in store for us. To the usual chaos of raising a young child, we added rounds of appointments with pediatricians, pulmonologists and respiratory therapists as we struggled to get some semblance of control over Jack’s asthma in the early years.
As a military family, we also moved regularly, which meant that not only was developing and maintaining relationships with Jack’s doctors and therapists a challenge, but our environment constantly changed. Every time we moved, we were looking for new triggers in the weather, the climate, our home, the new school, friends’ houses, etc. and then learning how to control those triggers. Despite having asthma, we were determined to make sure Jack had all the opportunities to do things like play soccer, go camping, and joining in all of the activities his friends were participating in.
With all of our moving around, I started journaling our daily life with asthma to record the challenges and triumphs that we had as a family trying to manage Jack’s asthma. LivingWithAsthma.net grew out of a desire to share our experiences and what we’ve learned so far in our journey as a family with asthma. It hasn’t always been easy, but Jack’s now a happy and active eleven-year old wreaking havoc in our household along with his 8 year-old brother Luke, and we wouldn’t have it any other way.
www.livingwithasthma.net/
Your Child’s Asthma: the 6 Crucial Steps To Maintaining Financial Health
If your child has a chronic condition like asthma, it’s not just enough to keep your child healthy. You owe it to yourself and the other members of your family to keep your family’s finances healthy as well. Unfortunately, paying for the treatment your child’s chronic condition requires may be quite expensive, and can easily [...]
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Finding the Perfect Sport for my Asthmatic Child
All kids love playing outdoors with their friends, biking or playing sports, and Jack is no different. He loves being outside, playing with his friends. The only catch was how to help him be active without triggering his asthma symptoms. We didn’t want to “baby” Jack just because he had asthma and keep him indoors [...]
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Green Means Go –How We Asthma-Proofed Our House
Once we’d outlined Jack’s asthma action plan, eliminating the asthma triggers which would push him into the yellow “caution” zone and the red “danger” zone from our house was the next step. I’m a pretty thorough housekeeper, but de-triggering our house involved a lot more than run-of-the mill sweeping and scrubbing. We had to completely [...]
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Ready…Set…Action! – How We Learned to Use an Asthma Action Plan
After the initial diagnosis, it became apparent that we had to figure out a way to control Jack’s asthma – at school, at home, at play – in other words, 24/7. What a tall order! It’s hard enough to raise an energetic child, let alone one with a chronic condition that has to be monitored [...]
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How I Learned My Child Had Asthma – and How I Learned to Live With It
Asthma became a part of our lives early, and has never left. Jack is our oldest son, and my husband and I were overjoyed when he arrived. Unfortunately, our joy was tempered with worry almost right away. Jack first experienced breathing problems as an infant. And not just little breathing problems. Before the six month [...]
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