Today I had an appointment with my pulmonologist, aka the lung doctor. As I have noted before in this blog, my breathing has been a major source of problems for me since I got sick. He has worked with me to find conventional and unconventional ways to combat this issue.

After a two hour appointment which included a walk around the office, a detailed medication breakdown and poring over recent labs, we decided on what to do next. The obvious idea is to either eliminate the symptom of not being able to breathe entirely, or at the least find a way to control it. We are going to try a Benadryl elixir that may be able to suppress the feeling of lost air. In the meantime, I have to wear an O2 monitor overnight, along with my CPAP in order to make sure that I am not losing oxygen in my sleep. This is important to check because as you may know, our breathing slows down when we sleep. Combined with my weakened muscles, this is something that has to be watched.

The CPAP was a result of a sleep study which showed that I had highly frequent episodes of hypoxia, with my breathing becoming too shallow. This may be in part because I am too weak to breathe in and out on my own, and so the pressurized air from the CPAP helps alleviate some of this work. For anyone that wears one of these, my thoughts are with you in trying to keep this thing on for an entire night. It is not sexy.

On a happier note, my dad is here to visit and my beautiful fiancé works a short shift today. I happen to be a film connoisseur and we should be able to watch a couple tonight. The collection I gathered before I got sick is now my lifeline as I am essentially on house arrest.

Everyone have a great start to the week. BANG! POW!