Hey Lovelies, 

This year I made one of my New Year’s resolutions to make the blog a lot more personal, and so I decided to introduce a number of new things to the blog on a weekly bases which I hope you all like. As well as my monthly favourites and hopefully some more future vlogs, because I really want to get back into that! 

However this post is going to be a different side to my personal life, as it doesn’t have much to do with films, but it will have a few mentions of them, as this is a lot more about my health. Since I was little I have struggled with Asthma. A condition that affects many people around the world and upon opening my Twitter the other day I was made aware of the annual World Asthma Day, that is held on the first Tuesday of every May, each year. I had never got involved with the day before, but I decided there and then that I wanted to discuss my asthma and ways in which you can help yours. 

A Day To Talk About The Condition!

For as long as I can remember I have struggled with my lungs. When I was small I can recall being being wheeled to the hospital in my pushchair by my mum, after our local doctor told her to go and get an X-Ray done on my chest. From there on  the blue and brown inhalers became a part of my life, as I had to use a mask to take them throughout the day and even during the night, while my lungs thought the infection wrecking my body. 

Once I was over this, I continued to control my asthma with the inhalers daily, until I entered my early teens. I became reliant on them to help me take part in exercise at school and if I was unlucky to catch a cold during that time. And did I need it in PE! When we did running my lungs refused to do anything of the sort and even though I wanted to complete the track and field, it prevented me (even though a teacher told me once that I should be able to because Paula Radcliffe has asthma!). I was okay with this though. I could deal with it perfectly. Right up until I caught Pneumonia, twice in one year, and my asthma and me became frenemies.

 I remember when I first got ill so clearly, as it was the week in which I was going to the Paralympics in London, a once in a life time event for me. In my mind I was excited to finally get to see Brazil, the country hosting the next ceremony, yet my body was saying think again. That September, my lungs said no, my body refused to eat anything, I was throwing up water and I didn’t/couldn’t leave my bed in fear of fainting and not having the strength to move. In fact to be brutally honest with you it got so bad, that at 17 I was asking my mum to dress me because I didn’t have the energy within in me to do so myself. My lungs were telling me to stop and my asthma was horrific. 

That moment when I asked my mum to get me dressed was the moment where me and my asthma started to come to terms with the fact that we needed to work together. My mum helped me down the stairs, into my dad’s car and the pair drove me to the asthma clinic, where I was made to walk up a flight of stairs. Not an easy thing let me tell you. Upon entering the doctor’s surgery I had to sit down and take my inhalers otherwise I thought my lungs were going to burn out. I wasn’t expecting to hear the words, “have you got a car? Good she needs to go to hospital now, I am admitting her straight away” as I was taking it though. 

The Life Saving Inhalers!

From there I was lead to A&E, plugged to an oxygen tank, had two arterial blood gases tests, which for someone who is fine with needles this is the most painful thing I have ever done, and admitted to stay in overnight. My asthma was telling me to let them take over and so I did. That night was the night in fact my asthma changed. After being told that I could have died and if I had left it another week I probably would not have been here (Sorry for the morbid stuff!) I was given a brand new inhaler. A purple one. And a new spacer. Both of which were heaven sent items to me! Along with some steroids and antibiotics, me and the purple inhaler became best friends and my asthma, while more affected than ever, decided to calm down and let me have some control over my body. Until the next bout of pneumonia, that hit just before Christmas. However the second time round wasn’t as bad. I had a control of my asthma and I knew how we were going to handle it. 

Since that very life changing moment in 2012, I have completely changed my life. While my asthma still affects me with a lot of things within my life, such as when I go out I can’t go to clubs with smoke machines and I have to be careful at concerts and theatre performances, as they often have them to, I have found a way to control it. I exercise so much more and my lungs can take it. I don’t find myself so dependent on them now when I work out and I can do tasks that before I never could have done without them. Although running is not one of them aha! 

What Happens In An Asthma Attack!

There are still times when my asthma is terrible and only a few weeks ago I got a cough that saw the pair of us reunited, but those moments are rare. I am still on the purple one due to the deep scaring that is in my lungs, but I hardly need it now. 

I am sure though many of you are wondering by now why I did this post and what it means. It wasn’t to point out a sob story or anything like that, but it was to show you how asthma is a condition that can change all the time. It is a common condition, but a scary one indeed. And we need to take a moment and think about it.  World Asthma Day does this every year, and as a supporter of it and the charity Asthma UK, I wanted to make a stand with them and prove that my condition isn’t going to beat me or I it, but that we will work together and look after the one body in which I have been given. Because I can’t change it, it is the only one I have. 

I do wish that I had better lungs. I wish that certain people understood that while it may seem like I am being a pain in the bum and not going to certain places, I am doing it because I have had my body tested. I have been shown the darkest side to suffering from asthma there possible could be, and it is now up to me to prove that it won’t happen again. 

As part of their campaign, World Asthma Day stands with the saying “It is time to control asthma”, something I completely agree with. It isn’t changing, it is developing, but if we take a small amount of our day, week, month or even year to think about the condition we can make a stand with it and help the millions around the world suffering with it. 

A Fantastic Charity!

It is time to show the world that while you can live with the condition, you don’t have to let it take over, I don’t. In fact I have had it for so long that I am not afraid to pull out my inhaler and have the whistle go off every time I take it. I am not afraid to speak about it. In fact I am happy to take about my condition, because it isn’t something that bothers me. I live with it. What bothers me is when people don’t take it seriously, because it can be a nasty horrible thing. 

I have probably gone on longer than I should have but I am very passionate about this day and the things in which it stands for. I hope to promote it every year from now on and in the future, maybe even today, I am going to find out a way to help Asthma UK and sufferers around the world and hopefully you lovely amazing people will to. 

If you want to find out more about World Asthma Day lovelies, as I probably didn’t explain all too well aha, here is the link to their site: http://www.ginasthma.org/World-Asthma-Day and if you want to find out more about the incredible Asthma UK charity, here is the link for that as well lovelies: http://www.asthma.org.uk/