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11/13/12 4:19 P

asthma effects everyone differently and sometimes even hits the same person in different manners. If I get around cigarette smoke my chest tightens immediately and I can't breath. Other times I start coughing, but I've never had the runny nose first.

As far as processed foods, I have found that eating real foods....from the earth, Mother Nature, God, or whatever adjective you'd like to use here has enabled me to completely control my asthma without any inhaled, injected or ingested steroid. It took about 6 months in combination with chiropractic treatments, but it worked and I save a lot of money and am rid of the side effects from those meds. If I can't recognize it as something that grew from the earth or had a mama, it doesn't go in this body. The first thing I did was get rid of the Diet Pepsi habit. That was huge.

For an easy, down to earth read try Jillian Michael's Master Your Metabolism. It's interesting. Good luck and keep working at it.

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11/13/12 3:59 P

Hi! I just did my first ever run the other day. I realized that I'm so accustomed to being completely sidelined by asthma that I don't really know the difference between an asthma attack and just being out of shape! I kept thinking about the emergency inhaler in my pocket and telling myself "no, it's not that bad yet" and made it through the session! About 15 minutes after I finished, though, full blown, no doubt about it, attack that had me grabbing the inhaler pretty fast!

Does anyone else have attacks that start with sneezing and runny nose? Turns out that a lot of the sinus infections I was plagued with as a child/teen/young adult may have started as asthma attacks! Now if I have a sudden onset runny nose or sneeze fit, I hit my inhaler and it'll stop and be normal again.

I haven't noticed a connection between prepackaged foods and asthma symptoms but I do notice other things about the foods. Processed foods give me more headaches and completely sap my energy.

Hopefully as we progress with our fitness goals some of the symptoms will be more easily manageable! In the meantime, lace up tight and grab the inhaler! Let's do this!

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11/11/12 8:34 A

Thanks! I have made the mistake of leaving my inhaler at home after not needing it on a previous run, but have learned the hard way that it's no guarantee :( That's interesting about the pre-packaged foods, I wonder what the connection is?

Posts: 797
11/11/12 4:25 A

I have steroid dependent asthma, and just did a 5K walk-jog in 42.13 and am progressing to the rookie running program. Just listen to your body! Never run without your inhaler and back off when your body tells you to. I found that using it before I "ran" helped prevent exacerbations later that day or the next, but you have to figure out what works for your body.

A bit of advice from something that worked for me, try to stay away from pre-packaged and artificial foods as much as possible. This little tidbit helped me get off the daily inhaled and oral steroids so my asthma is completely controlled with just my emergency inhaler now.

Good luck to you.

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11/9/12 12:08 P

Great advice, thank you! My asthma is very similar to yours, allergens are my biggest trigger and I find that some days I can get through an attack with purposeful breathing but other times I can't. I do need to get better at regulating my breathing when I run, and I like your idea of keeping a mask handy to help get through the borderline days outside. Thanks for getting back to me, I appreciate it :-)

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11/9/12 9:10 A

Hi Shanna:)
I run into the same things as you with the asthma. As we know asthma varies by person. My asthma is triggered by allergens, exercise and the cold and is usually a coughing gasp. That being said i have to kind of analyze it all the time. Tried working out outside during the height of leaf season and it was just too much of a trigger and the rescue inhaler could not keep up. May sound crazy, but I have used a mask when outside in the winter and with the seasonal allergies to cut down on the attacks. However I now have a treadmill and just stick to that during those times. Problem is I have to keep up disinfecting the edges (walls/floor) because of moisture and mold in the basement. Otherwise I have allergic asthma attacks. As for exercise it got easier during my workouts to not hit the inhaler as I learned to kind of regulate my breathing. In the beginning I was sucking in breaths because it was new to me. I get my worst exercise induced attacks right after my workout. For those attacks (don't happen as often) I work on breathing through it and usually don't have to hit the inhaler. You know the difference in attacks. Some days you just can't work through it on your own. Wish I had knew that I could work through it in my youth. Didn't know I even had asthma. Thank goodness my asthma only happens occasionally now.
You are NOT alone:)

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11/8/12 12:21 P

Hi all! Are there any other runners with asthma on the team? If so, how often do you find yourself needing to use an inhaler? I'm just curious, because it seems like some days I'm totally fine, other days I'll need it during a run, and then sometimes (like last night) I will make it through the run without needing it at all but then have an asthma attack right after I finish cooling down and stretching! I'm curious to know what other newbie runners experience with this.

Thanks for listening :-)
Shanna