It has been particularly hard adapting to my asthma diagnosis.
I thought that the reason I wasn’t good at athletic hobbies when I was a child was because I was out of shape.
In the area I had concerns with lots of physical hobbies because I would lose my breath much quicker than other people. This naturally discouraged me from being more active, despite the fact that I still liked to play outside with my friends if it didn’t involve a lot of running. As far as competitive athletic hobbies were concerned, I just couldn’t keep up with the other girls. Although many people would have been tested with asthma given the symptoms, my doctor never caught it. He wasn’t worried at the time about my inability to catch my breath and simply told me that I wasn’t being active enough. It wasn’t until last year that I was finally tested and told to use an inhaler and to get some kind of air cleaner for my house. I was telling my doctor about my breathing concerns at home before he provided me with my asthma diagnosis. Aside from getting an air cleaner to run in my dining room, I decided to update my air conditioner filters as well. For years I used cheap, flimsy filters because I didn’t see the purpose of a more fancy product. Now that I assume what my problems are with my respiratory system, I decided to look for allergen filters that collect tiny fungal, bacterial, and viral particles that are missed by cheap filters. You have to be careful about what brand and model you purchase because some are denser than others. If you use a filter that is too dense, it will significantly slow the air flower in your heating plus A/C system. Aside from performance drops, this could also put undue pressure on your air conditioner long term.