Sickness

For two weeks I had an annoying cough. This is not too unusual; it is the end of September and a ton of kids at school are sick. However, this "little cough" turned into something a lot more serious. As the days dragged on, I didn't seem to be improving. I began skipping swim practice, hoping that would help the cough go away before my swim meet. On the Saturday before the meet, I was feeling surprisingly good, and I thought that I would be able to swim. I was wrong. That night I only got a couple hours of sleep betwen my sore throat and constant coughing, and in the morning I could barely talk. At this point I had been sick for two weeks, so I not only skipped the swim meet, but also went to convenient care at Carle Hospital. At the convenient care, we talked to a doctor, and after checking my vitals and listening to my breathing, the doctor concluded that it was probably a sinus infection. She gave me a prescription for some antibiotics, and I thought that would be the end of it. Now I should mention that, for a couple of days before going to the doctor, I would have trouble breathing for a couple of seconds after coughing. This was a little disconcerting, but the doctor didn't seem worried, so I assumed it was normal.

I went to bed around 8:00 that night, hoping that if I got enough sleep I would be healthier in the morning. I woke up once around 10:00, coughed a little, got a drink of water, and drifted back to sleep. It was about 12:30 when I awoke again to a bad fit of coughing. I coughed for a couple seconds, and then, like some of my previous coughing fits, I had a moment where I was unable to breathe. However, this time it didn't go away. I am not sure how long I sat in my bed trying to breathe but unable to. It might have been two seconds or ten. Soon I began gagging, and still unable to breathe, I decided I had to do something. I jumped out of bed, threw my door open, and stumbled downstairs to my parent's room. My memory of what happened next is a little foggy, but after I got to my parents room and woke them up, it was about twenty seconds until I finally was able to breathe again. Now as I have mentioned, I am a swimmer, and swimmers often do breath holding sets that last for over a minute underwater. I doubt that I was unable to breathe for more than 45 seconds, but the fear and inability to get a breathe made it infinitely worse.

I was still shaking when my dad drove me to the Emergency Room. I was able to breath normally now, but I was still in shock from the experience. I was too scared to talk because I was afraid I might start coughing and have it happen all over again. At the ER, a nurse checked my breathing and blood pressure, said that everything seemed fine, and told me to wait. My dad and I sat in the waiting room for over an hour before they finally called us into a patient room. We then spent another hour waiting before the doctor appeared. The doctor asked me a series of questions and decided that I seemed okay now. He said that it was probably something called laryngospasm. The doctor said laryngospasm is not fatal, but can still be extremely frightening. He gave me an emergency inhaler and some cough drugs, and sent me home. I skipped the next two days of school and began to feel better. This weird thing didn't happen again until Thursday. I was walking down the hallway when I started coughing and suddenly couldn't breathe again. Just like before, it went away after about 20-30 seconds, but it was still disconcerting. It happened again that night, and five times the next day, but each time it eventually went away. I plan to see a specialist next week who can confirm the diagnoses and hopefully tell me how to prevent it. Although I now know that it won't kill me, I still dread every cough that could potentially cause it to happen again.