Yes, that is a direct quote from “The Princess Bride”. It is one of my favorite movies of all time. I could quote most of that movie easily, but it has been that quote that has been on mind lately.

We really do take our health for granted. We live in this bubble for a long time and believe that we are invincible until one day we aren’t. It seems like, all of a sudden, we can’t walk as much as we used to. We get tired a lot more easily. We can’t breathe as well as we used to. An extra 30-100 pounds have crept onto our bodies. We are wiped out after a half-day of work.

I decided some time, with some encouragement, to want better for myself. I wasn’t the only one. I had one friend get a wake-up call about her health. I have had friends and relatives find out they had Type 2 Diabetes and/or have significant thyroid issues. We have all talked about how hard it is to lose the weight now, eat healthier, and get the right treatment.

I finally decided to get my breathing fixed and get my allergies under control. I have been complaining for years to the doctor that I cannot breathe through my nose. I have been told it was congestion, allergies, swelling from both those things and possibly a deviated septum. I have been taking allergy medicine year-round for almost six years and seasonally before that.

My regular doctor did not want to pursue this. I find that very disturbing since this has been impacting my life. I don’t sleep well. I am out of breath a lot because I am not a natural mouth breather. I always have a lot of sinus pressure. I believe it has had an effect on my weight gain/loss. However, since the allergy medicine was working on some of the symptoms, they were fine with that. I even pursued a sleep study, but I passed the preliminary test (a pulse oxygen machine overnight) with flying colors.

I finally called in May to get into an allergy/ear, nose and throat doctor. I couldn’t get into testing until yesterday. I self-referred to a doctor. I haven’t done that except one other time for one of my children. I wanted answers and thank goodness I did!

You know what I found out? I don’t have allergies. Not one allergy. I went through the allergy testing and found out I was unnecessarily taking these medicines for years! This doctor listened to me and he knew right away what was probably wrong with me. All he had to do was look in my nose to know. He also gave the very uncomfortable experience of having a camera up my nose to make sure nothing else was wrong.

What was wrong? The turbinates in my nose are enlarged and swollen blocking off airflow. I haven’t been able to breathe through my nose for over ten years (at least) because of this. This can be fixed and rather easily! I am using a combination of two nose sprays and, if that doesn’t work, a simple ten-minute in-office procedure will fix it.

(Update 2/21/2020: I ended up having surgery on my nose in September 2017 to remove the swollen and damaged turbinates. The results were pretty good. I can breathe easily through my nose now.)

This is minor compared to what a lot of people have wrong with them. I realize that, but it was starting to really impact my quality of life. I have a few more health issues I would like to pursue, but this one seemed to be the most important. I have wanted to work out, sleep better, and lose weight. Not being able to breathe through my nose was impacting all of that!

The point of all of this is to get your health taken care of. Do not be afraid to ask for a specialist. If your regular doctor doesn’t seem to be listening to you, ask for another doctor. Otherwise, self-refer yourself to a specialist who can give you answers. Most people are not hypochondriacs. They know something is wrong with them and it needs to be fixed. It is just a matter of finding that doctor who will listen to them.

I have several things to say about the health industry, but this is the most important. There are good, mediocre, and bad doctors. Their hands are tied by a lot of things like policies and insurance. The good doctors will continue to find solutions and do the best they can by you. The mediocre doctors will just look at your symptoms and give blanket treatments/responses. The bad doctors will just not care because they are being paid by more than the hospital. The good doctors will be hard to see because they are well-liked and their schedule is full. However, a good doctor for you may not be a good doctor for someone else.

I still believe in home remedies, natural cures, and a holistic approach to medicine. I will probably never stray from that. However, sometimes you do need a conventional doctor. This is one of those times.

It is easy to put your health off until tomorrow. We often put ourselves last and we can pay the consequences for it. If some major crisis happens and we can’t get access to medical care, we are too late and we will probably pay for that. If you find yourself without help, can you do all the work or are you too unhealthy to do that?

I know what my answer would be which is why I am trying to lose weight now, eat healthier now, and getting any health issues addressed now. We don’t know what tomorrow may bring, but we need to be ready to face it.

Thanks for reading,
Erica

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