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Evil syrup

I was diagnosed with asthma when I was around eight. It coincided with the news that I was allergic to my favorite foods - pecans, cantaloupe, strawberries, tuna.... Oh, how I cried, when I was told that these morsels would be off limit to me. As you might have deduced, my asthma was triggered by allergies. It was also induced by exercise. (I think that's why I was oh-so-very couch-potato-like for many years. To the point that when I decided to get off my butt and try out for the soccer team my senior year of high school, and had to get something signed by a PE teacher, I was reminded that soccer entailed running. And she wasn't even my teacher. And I hadn't had PE for more than a year. But I digress - sharing with you the magnitude of my reputation for walking “the mile” every week is amusing, but not the point of this entry.)

So, the asthma - my mother remembers it otherwise, but in my memory it resulted in many a calls to my parents to pick me up from school early, due to asthma attacks. Or not even leaving the house to begin with. Heat triggered my attacks as well, and living in New Orleans, going to school in classrooms lacking air conditioners, or even ceiling fans at that point.... well, you get the picture. I also got pretty good at pretending to have, or self-inducing, asthma attacks, when I didn't feel like being in class. But whenever possible, I tried to avoid having severe attacks.

Severe attacks meant Quibron. *chills* Whenever my breathing (or lack thereof) got truly out of control, I started to panic. Not just because I couldn't breath. But because the administering of Quibron was near. Even now, probably 20 years after my last spoonful of the grossness, it makes me shudder. The flavor was disgusting. So much so that I can't even describe it. And that's why my asthma attacks were often accompanied by tears, and pleas to my parents to not put that spoon in my mouth. But since they loved me, and wanted me to continue breathing, they forced me to open my mouth and then swallow that swill. This was then usually followed by my eating dill pickles, as a strange side effect of the Quibron was a craving for pickles.

I eventually finagled other prescriptions - usually smaller doses of pills meant for adults. These often made me stay up all night, or gave me gas. But I didn't care. Yes, I will swallow all the pills necessary, just don't make me take Quibron. A side effect of these later medications was a clean room by the time my parents woke up.

I now rarely have asthma attacks, and when I feel like I'm moving toward one, I use the handy inhaler. I realized just now, as I took a puff (which is what reminded me of the above), that this is the first inhaler that is legally mine. For the past ten years, I've scammed them from the other members of my family with asthma. You think I would just get a prescription, but because I don't really have problems, I don't usually think about getting one.

As for Quibron, it seems that today's children are free of this threat. I couldn't even find the drug in my electronic Physicians' Desk Reference. I found it at Drugstore.com, but only in tablet or capsule form. So, if my kids ever have asthma, and complain about whatever meds they have to take, I can just tell them that in my day it was Quibron, and there is nothing more evil.

Posted by Shokufeh at June 23, 2003 02:40 PM