English
As Nicole Audrey Spector tells
I went for a day of 2023. It was a simple walk. It wasn’t a big deal. When I came home, I cough. I was horrified because I thought I had Covid. I panicked because I have scleroderma. They diagnosed me in 2001 when I was 19 years old. If you live with chronic autoimmune disease as scleroderma, you have a high risk. I knew I could die from covid.
That night I slept out of the hot summer air. In addition to coughing, I had difficulty breathing and I felt suffocated, but breathed better due to fresh and soft air.
The next day my symptoms remained equally serious. My husband was worried because my situation got worse and might need a respiratory protection masks. So I went to a hospital.
I had negative results when they carried out the Covid test, but they quickly admitted me to the hospital and carried out a lung function test, an echocardiogram and blood tests. All of this showed that he recently had two heart attacks. My medical providers (HCP) came to the conclusion that heart attacks were caused by chronically obstructive lung disease (COPD). I knew that it had an interstitial lung disease, inflammation and healing of lung tissue caused by scleroderma. He had lived with it for about a year. But COPD was a completely new diagnosis.
According to medical care, the Skleroderma caused the COPD, which triggered the scleroderma outbreak, which in turn made the arteries of my heart’s block. I also closed my neck. I couldn’t swallow. Not even a pill.
I was hospitalized for six weeks. You put the endoprosthesis in my heart to open the arteries. You have exposed me to a neck to expand my esophagus. They also delivered breathing treatments and medication to control the symptoms of COPD.
One of the best things I did in the hospital was to speak every day with a good friend, another survivor of Skleroderma. He called them when medical providers came to make their rounds. Activated the speaker to hear everything. I don’t feel particularly certain when it comes to my ability to understand medical jargon, especially if you only talk about me. My dear friend heard everything my medical providers said, and when they went, I explained everything in a way that was easy to understand. It was my personal medical consultant and I recommend anyone who feels overwhelmed while he suffers from an illness, someone who fulfills this function.
My husband and daughter, who was 12 years old at the time, were worried that she died. I was also afraid. He had already suffered a lot with scleroderma, including several amputations. Many people who have endured for this disease do not live much longer.
But honestly, when I had this COPD crisis, I was almost more stress than afraid. My life is incredibly busy. I am a mother, I lead a company, I work as a mentor and I am immersed in the work of consciousness for chronic diseases. I travel frequently and always do a million different things at the same time. I had to get away from my many projects to deal with all of this, and I really delayed myself and the feeling that I disappointed everyone.
After I had returned home after staying in the hospital, I didn’t really know what my future would look like or how my life would change with Copoc, which like scleroderma has no healing. But I quickly got used to everything (luckily my symptoms with medication and breathing treatments are under control). I started examining to understand the disease better and better live with it. Now I am passionate about people with COPD and do an enormous amount of work in the COPD community.
At the moment I am still equally busy as always, but my illnesses influence my body. It seems that I can’t travel as much as before or not at all. I am not excited, but I’m not angry either. My consciousness work makes it part of something much larger than me. I think that’s my purpose. I saw how many friends die, some under physical conditions much better than mine. I don’t guarantee a moment of my time here.
Yes, I am sick like everyone who lives with COPD. But being sick does not mean that you should be sad. It does not mean that you have to be alone. Not at all. An important problem that I see in the COPD community is that many people who have not communicate for help. There are many people who only disappear because of the illness. I hope that more people from our community open their minds and eyes and understand that there are entire organizations that support people with COPD. You can access many resources by searching on Google.
We are all stronger than we think and that may even apply to women. We can endure practically everything if we accept it. If you live with COPD or a chronic illness, I invite you not to consider this as a death sentence, but as a new process. And here are many of us that we want to accompany during this process.
This educational resource was created in collaboration with the COPD Foundation and with the support of Glaxosmithkline, Regeneron and Sanofi.
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