I was on my way home from work, debating various toppings on the mini pizza I was going to order from Domino's.
As I walked, I sang to myself - as I am often want to do, although today's choice drew a few odd looks rather than the usual amused/approving smiles that I usually get* - and watched all the people going about their business, enjoying the sunshine and the sight of all the little birds flittering around and generally just feeling better than I have done in a couple of days.
As I passed by the benches that line the walkway between two sections of town, I saw that there was a woman sat on one of them. As I actually passed by the bench in question, however, and glanced across at her, I noted that she wasn't sat so much as slumped.
Then I noted that she was gasping.
I knew what it was. I'd suffered with it myself often enough. This woman was having an asthma induced panic attack. The kind that starts off as an 'Oh Dear, I Need My Inhaler And A Brief Rest' situation then for whatever reason escalates into another kind of situation; the kind where the brain stops thinking in sentences and all your thoughts get squished together into one long unending stream of panic.
It isn't easy to put into text, but to give you an idea, it looks kind of like this:
ohshitmyinhalerisn'tworkingandican'tbreathewhyisn'tmyinhalerworkingohgodican'tbreatheohgodohgodohgod...
...Yep. I know that feeling well. And I knew exactly what that woman needed.
So I did it.
I asked if she was "OK". Of course, she wasn't, and we both knew that already, but it opened up the lines of communication. It gave her the chance to shake her head and me the chance to walk over and stand next to her. And more importantly, it gave her the knowledge that there was someone there; someone ready and willing to Help.
That was it. That was what she needed. Another human being reaching out in a gesture that says "hey, you're in a bad way right now, but I'm here and I will help you if I can."
For a moment she couldn't talk and I didn't encourage her. Instead I said in a calm voice that it was OK; to take in breaths as deep and as slow as she could manage. Nodding, she did.
It took a few minutes to have any effect - when you get to that stage it always does - but the awareness that I was there was encouragement enough for her to persevere, and before too long her condition had improved enough that through gasps of breath, she was able to talk.
She explained that she had a lung condition. That it was bad right now because she had a cold. That she had tried to make it but failed and so she had sat down and tried to concentrate on breathing slowly but she couldn't do it, and it got worse and worse and she just needed somebody to stop, but until I came along it had looked as though nobody would.
As she remembered those desperate minutes alone, she began to panic all over again. A distraction was necessary so I asked her if she used an inhaler. Her breathing coming in small, painful sounded groans, she nodded; yes, she did. Good, I said, then I asked her if she had it with her. Another nod, another good from me. Then stage 3: I told her to take it out of her bag and use it.
Gratefully, she did.
One puff. Two puffs. Three. She lingered over each, which was good. Too often the feeling of loosing control of their lungs will cause an asthmatic to dash at it; pressing the plunger too hard and breathing in too quickly, which sends the dose carreening into the back of the throat with such force that it sticks there, unable to reach the lungs and worse, creating the urgent need to cough. And coughing is the very last thing an asthmatic in need of medication needs.
...Actually usually in the event of such an attack as the woman had, medical professionals would say that taking asthma medication of any kind is a Very Bad Idea, which sounds odd; dangerous, even, but in most cases it's very true (I'll explain why in another post)...
Anyway, back to the woman. She took her inhaler - and took it well - three times within a five minute period, and by the time those five minutes were up, she was as back to normal as a person with a lung condition that has a cold and has just suffered an asthma induced panic attack can be.
I offered to fetch her something to drink - Aldi's was just a few feet away - but she declined. She felt much better now, and able to carry on again. It was the cold; it had made her asthma so much worse than it normally is, and once it started she couldn't stop it.
She was embarrassed now, but relaxed when I told her that I understood. I had trigger asthma, and in the summer - when zillions of kinds of pollen, my main triggers - were around, an attack would often come out of nowhere.
I could tell she was itching for me to go now - not rudeness, just; 'we shared a crappy experience that I now want to put behind me and forget as soon as possible' - but I wanted to check two things first. The first thing was what she planned on doing now, and she answered that she was going to walk slowly to Morrison's (just across the road) and have a nice long sit down in their cafe and a cup of tea to make sure she was fully recovered. Then she was abandoning the rest of her shopping and going home to the cat. Good.
The second was whether she took other asthma medication or was the Blue One** all she had, to which she answered she used two kinds: The Blue and The Brown. I said that that was good; that the Brown would be helping the minimize the effects, but recommended talking to her doctor very soon about possibly taking a stronger one while she recovered from her cold. The Purple One, perhaps.
Another grateful smile revealed that that idea hadn't occurred to her.
I knew she needed me to leave, but still I hesitated, nervous that she might have a relapse.
Realizing this, she smiled a third time and assured me that she would be alright, truly, and that she didn't want to hold me up any longer. But she was ever so grateful, she said, to me for having stopped; she couldn't express how grateful...
And then, she cried.
It was brief, no more than a few tears escaping and rolling down her cheeks, but still it filled me with a sense of shock. I, Alice Collison, had caused a complete stranger to be so morally indebted to me - for the mere act of stopping - that she cried. Because nobody else had, and she had feared that nobody would; that the people walking past were either too absorbed by their thoughts to notice her slumped on a bench unable to breath enough to even cry out for help, or that they were either too shy or too callous to do anything about it even if they had.
One final smile passed between us and then we parted, going our separate ways. Her to Morrison's cafe and me to Iceland where I brought a bigger pizza than I had originally intended (Oh shut up. It was only one size up. And anyway, I earned it!) and a bag of sweets (...again, shut up...) before trudging off home to be greeted by an uninterested dog that barely pricked his ears at my arrival, let alone wagged his tail.
And so now here we are; with pizza and sweets eaten - and my God, they were good - and me trying to figure out what to finish this post off with and unable to come up with anything more profound than the though that; 'damn. I made a stranger cry today. By being nice...'.
=shrugs= Meh. I'll go with that.
Damn. I made a stranger cry today. By being nice...
...Go me.
Alice x
* for those interested, it was "Touch-a Touch-a Touch-a Touch Me!" from the Rocky Horror Picture show.
** again, for those interested, there are 3 types of Inhaler that every asthmatic knows:
~ The Blue One: otherwise known as Ventalin (spelling?) and designed to ease mild-medium attacks.
~ The Brown One; a preventative designed to help the body strengthen itself enough to stop attacks before they start.
~ And finally the Purple One; one that no person I've talked to knows a thing about other than they only give it to you when you are v.poorly and "duuude; it's kick-ass!".
...why haven't I asked a medical professional about The Purple One, I hear you ask? Because that would involve being all mature and stuff and going in - with my mature big-girl knickers on - to have my Annual Asthma Checkup, which I have successfully avoided doing for about 3 years now. That's why.
Anyway, I know it's only doled out on special occasions (of the sickness kind) and that's its purportedly "kick-ass". That's good enough for me.
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