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Respiratory Alert

When I was twelve years old I was diagnosed with severe asthma. Breathing was a lesson in futility. I couldn’t run anymore, I put on ten pounds and got called “The Fat Kid” at school. Before my asthma I was lean and had an easy charm for a snot-nosed pre-pubescent kid. After I acquired asthma, I spent half of every thought on keeping my breath.

It seemed to doctors as though I had a rare case insofar as so many things seemed to trigger severe attacks. I was missing weeks of school at a time. They switched me from one school to another, hoping that would help, but nothing did.

It was a matter of blind luck that we had insurance. Perhaps the planets were aligned for a brief moment. We never had any access to health care when I was a kid. I’m not sure if it was a matter of not being able to afford it for my father as much as a matter of not wanting to be able to afford it. I think I went to the dentists three times in my first eighteen years of life (each time the presiding dentist would insist on closing the half-inch gap between my two front teeth with braces and each time my father would brush off the dentist, explaining that braces were unnecessary.) I’d been to the doctor half a dozen times before my asthma that I can remember. With the asthma, the visits were half a dozen a month.

No amount of inhalers seemed to do the trick.

My mother made sure everything was tried to fix things while my father made sure every doctor knew he thought I was faking it.

To continue reading, please purchase this short story for the Kindle. It appears as part of the collection of short stories "A Simpler Time: Six Mostly True Stories"

For those without a Kindle, it's available via .pdf by clicking the link below.



Comments

Anonymous said…
Okay, now that's three stories in your blog that are about how much you hate your father. Interesting...
Unknown said…
This actually happened.

And all these stories about "daddy issues" wouldn't be surprising if you knew my dad.
Anonymous said…
I can't handle you talking about your
suppose to be, child's erection.

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