COPD NOT FUNMy name is Karen. I am a 57 yr old woman. Who will be married for 35 yrs in Sept,I have one child,a daughter who is turning 33 yrs old (in Dec. The best thing in my life are my two Grandchildren.a boy 6 and a girl 5. They are the smart.beautiful,polite,and the best well behave children you will ever meet. I have COPD. Yes I was a smoker. I started when I was a teenager and stopped almost 8 yrs ago. I stopped because I was told I had severe COPD. No doctor had ever told me that before. I didn't know about COPD. I never heard of it. I came home from my doctors apt. and looked it up on the Internet.I was blown away. I found out it was incurable,and as time went by my lungs will work less and less. Basically I am slowly suffocating. Have you ever ran a long race,or exercised till you could not breathe. Remember how it hurt to try to breath and the panic that started to set in. Well, I get that feeling when I shower,even though I am sitting,When I clean the bathrooms, the house. It takes all week to clean the house because I can only clean one room a day. Then I have to rest. The above is while I am on 4 liters of Oxygen 24 hrs a day.The worst thing is to change my sheets or vacuum. Both are an all day job. This disease is not in the public eye because,it is mostly caused by cigarettes. Most of the general public thinks it's our fault we smoked. You die you deserved it. No one deserves this. It's just like Aids no one deserves to die like that. Dying is a scary thing for most people. Dying without dignity is scarier. Asking your spouse to wash your back because you can't,asking them to help you push a grocery cart because you can't do it and breathe. Seeing the disgusted look on their face as they take the cart from you.The hardest thing is to be up and pretend to feel good and be happy. You do that for the people in your life. I went to UCSF to see if I qualified for a lung transplant. After a yr of testing,They still did not know if I could qualify because I also have a blood disorder. They said I need to figure out if I wanted quality of life or Quantity of life. Transplanted lungs of smokers only last 2 to 3 yrs and then they start scarring. It they told me this when we first went. I would have NOT gone through a yr of agonizing tests My life is hard to live. I live for my 2 beautiful Grandchildren who I see 2 sat's a month,and sometimes they spend the night. I can't run with them. But, We do a lot of things together. We color,We read,we play computer games.We watch movies,we make Christmas gifts,We talk about their lives and what they want to be when they grow up. Basically, I give them all my attention. I only hope that I am making some lasting memories for them. I know they will forget me. I am praying that won't be for a long time. I don't want them sad. I want them to remember the good times we had together. Just the 3 of us. COPD is not only devastating to the person who has the disease. It is devastating to their family also. Once you were a couple. That changes. The healthy person becomes your caregiver. You lean on them for things you never did before,Like taking a shower or making a bed. It's very hard to be a Burden on the person/people you love.It makes you feel that you have nothing to give,only take. You feel like they would be better off if you were dead. My husband told he would be better off if I was dead. He only said it once but I will never forget it. I know in my heart he will be. I am selfish. I don't want to say good by to my grand babies yet. That is just too hard for me to do now. I don't sit around feeling sorry for myself.I will admit that I cry when I am by myself. But, I force myself to try to be active. No matter how much I hurt,I do things becauseexercising best thing COPD. I want to live a few more years because of my grand kids. I should have said this in the beginning I also have very bad asthma,and I am on 4liters of Oxygen 24 hours a day. Lately when I do anything like walk around the house.First let me say our house is small. We had sold our other home. Which my husband loved. It had two car garage,large rooms, three bathrooms and it was a two story. I could not walk up the stairs or keep it clean. My husband hates the house we are in now,but he made the sacrifice because of my health. I hate that he had to do that. I don't think he will ever forgive me for it. He would tell me how much he hated this house about every month when we first move in it. I felt so bad. We move because of my health.My 02 levels are not as good as they should be. I see them gone down ever day. If I walk around I am in the high70if I sit and don't move I am in the high 80's which is not great but it's better than As of 3 weeks ago that has changed. Now, if I do something like cleaning the house,getting the mail, or showering. My oxygen level is in the low 60s. The other day I rolled over my oxygen cord with my wheel chair and the chair cut it,in 3 places. It took me about 5 minutes to get a new cord hooked up. I could not breathe. I thought I was going die. When I finally got the Oxygen hooked up. My 02 stats were 61 I was all alone. That was one of the scariest time of my life. �My marriage is over. We can't get divorced because I need health care. My husband� does not want to be married to me because I try to manipulated everything. I have to have my way. I was like that for a long time. But, I have changed since last Nov. when I got on a different anti depressant.�I thought we were happy after my medicine change. But he kept screaming and yelling at me. Bringing things that happen 25/30 yrs ago. I can't depend on him to help me. He says yes but I have to ask at least 3 more time two to get it done. Or I do it myself. Like putting the mail in the mailbox. Vacuuming,or cleaning the kitchen floor. Also my daughter has disowned me. Right about now you must be thinking I am a horrible person. As far as my daughter is concerned that was my fault. I said things to her her new husband I should not have said. The fact is he is an�very nice.hat was in Oct. I think it has been two yrs now since I have spoken to my daughter. I have written her twice once an email apologizing to her and husband and by mail Congratulating her on being pregnant. I hope no one ever knows what it feels like to know you will have a grandchild you will never see. People(including spouses)�don't understand the , the frustration of being so short of breath you can barely make it to the bathroom and back, or how difficult it may be to towel-off after a bath, or how it feels to be dependent upon a little plastic tube you must wear in your nose and drag behind you everywhere you go. And they can’t imagine how tears come to your eye when you remember the way you used to get your work done in an orderly fashion and reasonable time, or the last time you were able to run with your Grandchild or alone for that matter.To carry grandchildren in your arms. Do they understand that you can’t breathe when you lie down, so spend your nights in a sitting up sometimes. What it’s like to now need from others with things you use to do yourself. Luckily, most people have been spared the feeling that comes with the closing-off of your throat that makes you clutch your breast and gasp for breath and fumble for an inhaler, and the mounting fear that compounds the problem, as you anticipate it getting worse... My marriage is completely over now. My husband wants to be able to start a new life. He hates me for things from 15 to 25 yrs ago. And he does not think I have changed. I have in the past six months. It might be a slow change but I have changed. I pointed out three things to my husband when he said I have not changed.He never said anything about the 3 changes. I thought of one more. I did not read an email he sent me,I stopped 2/4 through it. It was only making me feel bad. I couldn't do anything about what he said so. I did not finish it I deleted it. I told my or ex I should say that is was a mean email. He apologize for the last two lines Well I had the email in delete. I read it and cried my eyes out. His life would be perfect if I did. He did not think I would live this long. He told me that his living with a woman has nothing to do with me. remember we are still married. I want to bring this out. (I was told my marriage was over that my husband was moving out,and that he had met a woman who was coming cross country to live with him ALL IN TWO EMAILS.) He did not even have the decency to tell me to my face.I think it has everything to do with me. He also says that his mistress will not take my place with our grandchildren. I told him I have no worries about that. Those kids love me as much as I love them. I was right. One of little ones doesn't like the new woman. I got that from my husband.
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7/4/09
by Grandmummy
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