Fighting the flu
I hate to catch the flu. I don’t think anybody enjoys it, but it makes me feel like a wimp. A flu can really beat me down.
One night last week I thought I would die. My head was heavy — as my sinuses were filled with phlegm, my nose was completely stuffed, a migraine hit hard if I so much as winked an eyelid. I had to breathe through my mouth. This is easy to do, but not as you swallow.
Somehow I did this in my sleep and woke up when I couldn’t get air. I panicked forcing a cough then sucked air in so rapidly through my mouth that I was hyperventilating. I felt I couldn’t stop. I felt I wasn’t getting enough air.
I began to feel the nerve endings on the bridge of my nose, and the backs of my hands.
Inside I felt a cold surge wave down my body so I pulled the covers tighter around my sweat-drenched pyjamas.
I had been boiling hot the moment before. I was scared. Tears coming out of my eyes I was still hyperventilating. My dear husband rubbed my back telling me to relax and breathe. But my mind was all over the place.
I really felt I wasn’t getting enough air. I started talking to myself to try and calm down. I said: “It’s okay, you’ll be okay. Calm down. Calm down.”
I said this very slowly and very lovingly. I figured it was best to try and convince myself in this tone. But the tingling in my hands and nose was intensifying and my sore back was beginning to pain. I couldn’t calm down. I was able to think and after some time asked my husband to make me a glass of water and sugar.
I thought my electrolyte balance might have been off kilter and that the sugary water would stabilise me.
I’m not clear if that is what happened but a few minutes after drinking the solution I felt fine and was able to drift off to sleep. Not soundly. I was soon up again coughing and trying to get air. Blowing my nose during a cold is always a loud affair. This time was no different it woke my husband up — perhaps more accurate is that it never allowed him to sleep. So I also felt guilty. How would he be able to perform well at work?
But then there are my problems too. How will I ever get my health articles done? I was too sick. Even lying down I felt so weak. I couldn’t sit at the computer and get a thing done. I felt like a wimp.
So just what could I have done to feel better or better yet, what could I have done to avoid this nightmare altogether? I asked a retired physician friend who said frequent hand washing is one of the best preventative measures.
The Center for Disease Control in Atlanta, Georgia also advises frequent hand washing as a means to not only guard against the cold and flu but also against a host of other infectious diseases.
As the writer of this page, I constantly encounter education and awareness on the importance of frequent hand washing. Most recently 14-year heart transplant survivor Calvin Ming told me copious hand washing was the secret behind his never contracting an infection since the transplant.
I was impressed. I made a conscious effort to wash my hands much more. So when I went to the hospital for an interwhen I went to the hospital for an interview recently I decided to take advantage of the free hand sanitizer in the main lobby. It is in a dispenser on the wall together with protective face masks and a box of tissue.
I depressed the pump but nothing came out. I did it again — perhaps the fluid was getting low — nothing. I did it again and still nothing. I took a tissue and wiped my hands and nose.
I went up on the cardiac unit and did my interview. About ten minutes after leaving the hospital my throat felt a bit scratchy. I had caught a bug.
I think I caught it at the hospital. My retired physician friend said the timing is most likely coincidental and that I must have been exposed to the bug beforehand. She said the transmission could have been as innocuous as touching a doorknob a minute after an infected person.
So the best guidelines for avoiding infection are:
1) Avoid close contact with infected people.
2) Wash your hands frequently (pictured).
3) Avoid touching your eyes, nose and mouth.
4) Get a flu shot.
Getting a flu shot is considered the most effective method of avoiding infection but it is an avenue not available to everyone including people with an allergy to eggs or to the shot.
Local health professionals stress that an important aspect of avoiding infections includes having those infected act responsibly. Infected people should remain at home for the duration of the illness, avoid close contact with healthy people, wash their hands frequently and cover their cough and sneezes.
