Just over a month ago, I had a CT scan of my chest which revealed considerably more than I expected. I knew I suffered from asthma – I have done since the age of four.
I also knew I had broken the T8 vertebra three years ago, though I was concerned to hear it was still somewhat out of shape.
More frightening, though, was the one below – the T7. It had collapsed. No wonder my back pain had got worse.
But it was the doctor’s next question which really shocked me. Did I use steroid asthma inhalers?
My answer was an emphatic ‘Yes’. As an adult my asthma has been kept under control with a blue puffer which used to be known as Ventolin. I’ve used it since 1969, never dared to leave home without it.
There was also a brown puffer which was a preventer. In recent years, this has been updated with a puffer in a red tube called Fostair. The red is a preventer – two puffs every morning and again at night; the blue is the reliever, a good strong puff during a breathless episode would ease the symptoms and enable me to breathe again.
They may have kept me safe from a lethal asthma attack all these years, but I didn’t know there was a potentially grave consequence to taking them.
‘Got to get you off steroids,’ said the doctor. ‘They’re bad for your bones.’ Who knew being on steroid inhalers for long periods of time makes your bones brittle?
Jenni Murray’s brown inhaler was recently updated with a puffer in a red tube called Fostair, but she was shocked when a doctor told her the steroids inside it were bad for her bones
I am now anxiously waiting for a prescription for nonsteroidal puffers and hope they work as well as my old ones.
During my childhood my mother would put together steaming bowls of hot water and some sort of medicine which helped relieve an attack.
I only had one life-threatening visit to the hospital. I was ten when my terrified parents bundled me into Dad’s van and rushed me to casualty. I can still remember the terror of not being able to breathe.
I am guessing the hospital used Prednisolone, another steroid, and plenty of oxygen. There’s no doubt they saved my life. Thanks to my careful use of my puffers, I’ve never again needed to go to hospital with an asthma attack. Let’s hope the same is true of my new non-steroid version.
Even though the news about my bones has been a shock, I don’t regret using the puffers for so long. They worked on my breathlessness and not being able to breathe is too awful to endure.
What an absolute pain this growing older is. The trouble is, when you finally get around to investigating all the little problems that have gnawed away at you, every conversation with a doctor seems to raise the possibility of unimaginable difficulty.
Before the CT scan, I’d had Covid in October, which had caused post-viral fatigue – hence the need for a closer look at my lungs.
In January, I had a cardioversion, a medical procedure to try to fix atrial fibrillation – the irregular beating of my heart.
For a few days after the op, my heart beat in a regular ‘sinus’ rhythm, but then I felt it – the occasional juddery feeling in my chest, a slight breathlessness. Atrial fibrillation was back with all its infuriating risk of stroke and blood clots, hopefully now tempered by the alarming number of preventative drugs I take every day.
Jenni, who has suffered from asthma since the age of four, says she is anxiously waiting for a prescription of nonsteroidal puffers, but wonders if they will work as well as her old ones
Something will have to be done. My two cardiologists agree there is no point in repeating a procedure which failed. A pacemaker was put on the table for discussion instead. Meanwhile, there’s more work to be done with the blessing of the chest specialist who ordered the CT scan.
A sleep survey may help to uncover why I’m still suffering from paralysing post-Covid exhaustion. I’m also to have a physiotherapist who specialises in building muscles in the chest and the lungs.
Sounds like hard work to me, but this time folks, I shall definitely do it. Worry now piles upon worry as you realise how vulnerable you can be to things you’ve never before thought of.
Of course, I’ve had concerns about cancer, having been there once before, but so far so good.
I never thought my eyesight would put me in a tizzy. It’s always been brilliant even though the on-the-nose glasses have long been part of my face.
Suddenly, there are cataracts and operations everyone tells me are no trouble at all. Maybe they’re right but I can hardly bear the thought of a surgeon working on my actual eye.
Then, of course, there’s more. I used to have legs and feet of which to be proud. That is no longer the case. Some days, my feet and ankles are so swollen stiff, I can barely get my shoes on. The problem appears to be lymphoedema. Lymph fluid gathers in places it shouldn’t, and the question then is how to get rid of it and get great legs again.
Next in my list of appointments is a vascular surgeon who is happy that my blood flows up and down my legs OK, but the lymphatic fluid appears stuck in my calves.
I have to learn to walk properly again, as exercise is no doubt the best thing I can do to activate what some people call the ‘heart in the calf’. The calf can pump liquid about the body as the main heart does.
As for my spine I’ve no idea what’s to be done. I shall have to find someone with expertise in spinal surgery but it’ll go on the back burner for now.
Please do think of me kindly in the midst of all this hassle. When friends ask me if I’ve been out of the house for anything other than a medical appointment, I hope soon to be able to answer ‘yes’.
Apple’s proof beauty is a curse
Apple Martin revealed she had lip filler when she was 18 but now regrets it. Our columnist asks why beautiful girls have such procedures: ‘Is it the pressure of being gazed upon too much?’
Apple Martin, Gwyneth Paltrow’s 21-year-old daughter, recently confessed to having had a cosmetic procedure she now regrets.
She had lip filler when she was 18.
I can’t understand why such a beautiful girl would feel she needs to be enhanced in such a way, but so often it is the loveliest women who go for Botox and tweakments. Is it the pressure of being gazed upon too much? They must look for constant improvements.
Not a worry for most of us, sensibly happy with what we’ve got.
Hurrah for my hi-tech home town
Who’d have thought my hometown, Barnsley, would become the first tech capital of the UK?
Forty-odd years after the mining industry was decimated, the government has finally thrown the town a lifeline in the form of AI. May it bring lots of jobs.
How things change – I never even had a computer when I was growing up there.
A word of warning to any men tempted by the Bank of England’s new liberal dress code which says high heels are now fine to wear with your suit. Don’t be fooled. I wore heels for 45 years. My back has never forgiven me.
Pink? Daffodils should be yellow
Urged by the Royal Horticultural Society to check our gardens for the increasingly rare pink daffodil, I went out and studied the three in the process of flowering – all are relentlessly yellow, as I was always taught they should be, hey, Wordsworth!
As spring approaches, Jenni searched for the rare pink daffodil in her garden but the only ones she could find were bright yellow – as they should be, she says
We hear so much from those opposed to the assisted dying bill about palliative care as the alternative.
I hope peers dithering over the bill are aware that one in three in the UK now dies in terrible pain thanks to the lack of such care. How cruel those opponents must be.
