|
|
 |
COPD
By Abraham Lincoln
I felt immortal back then. I was mired in black volcanic sand on the
beach at Iwo Jima. Scrambling up that slope was as impossible when I
had to do it as it has always been.
The black lava beach was a nightmare and I remember looking at the
volcanic mountain named, “Suribachi”, on my left and the caves where
Japanese machine gunners sprayed bullets—we were panting and gasping
for air to breathe.
As soon as I got on top and looked down into the volcano’s steaming
crater, I grabbed my shirt pocket and pulled out a pack of
cigarettes—Camel—the Camel’s slogan: “I’d walk a mile for a Camel” but
it seemed like walking two or three miles would be easier than climbing
to the top of the steaming Suribachi volcano.
I was young and felt I could do almost anything but I was already
troubled with breathing. I didn’t have Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary
Disease (COPD) then by had bronchitis and a touch of asthma.
Not related was my “flat feet” that kept me from standing or marching
in parades. I had a slip of paper that excused me from any of those
activities.
Now, some 60 plus years later, I still have COPD and my breathing is an
ongoing struggle. I have to use inhalers to open airways so I can take
a bigger breath and I have oxygen bottles and oxygen concentrators that
enables me to keep a steady supply of oxygen going into my lungs.
Without the medical treatments and medications I use every day I would
have had a stroke a long time ago. I am fortunate to live now when
there is some help available—a few years ago and I would have succumbed
to the disease and been a name on a stone monument.
At eighty years of age, I only have memories of how I used my life and
what I did to myself and what politics did to me. The tobacco lobby in
Washington made sure the Army had cigarettes in our C-rations and they
all knew that smoking caused cancer and heart disease but they gave
every soldier a package whether he smoked or not.
|
|
|
<
|
