Living On Oxygen for Life
As an oxygen user, I think we’ve all experienced mishaps. I know I’m one of those people. Here is my top 5 things that I don’t want to have happen as an oxygen user.
TOP FIVE LIST
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Dropping a highly expensive medicine pill out of the bottle into a wet bathroom sink and it goes down the drain and/or on the floor where a pet could find it. Not good!
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Taking your diuretic pills and then forgetting that you already took the medicine only to take them again and ending up staying up all night suffering the consequences.
- If you use liquid oxygen: Having the portable and/or reservoir tank freeze open to spit out liquid oxygen when you absolutely have to go somewhere.
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While using your oxygen, one side of the nasal prong comes completely separated and not having a spare canula!
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Having a car mishap (engine trouble) in the middle of nowhere near a pay phone because you realized that you forgot your cellphone.
I have had all of these happen to me. My life is full of these fun adventures. What are your top 5?
My favorites (lol):
1. Coming home from a local outing with almost dead batteries in the POC and then having the power go out. I how have a back up system.
2. Thinking you have X hours of battery life in the POC, only to have one of the batteries go complete DEAD.
3. Finding that your wonderful little great nephew turned down the flow rate on the room concentrator. (And you wondered why you were so tired & SOB.) He was 2 at the time.
OHMYGOSH! I’ve had your number 3 happened to me too. I wondered what in the world was wrong with me at the time. The child who did this was the same age as your nephew. =o) Thanks for adding to the list of The Top 5! lol!
hey your still here huh, that’s what they told me at the hospital, after they picked me up from going on my daily walk and my oxygen run out lol, its taken me 3 weeks to come right
Ouch! You fell? *hugs*
Yikes! 3 weeks? *hugs*
Christine, your #3 always happens when I am in a hurry and portable liquid unit freezes up for some reason and won’t fill. I think it’s the universe’s way of telling me to slow down 😃.
Basil, I wasn’t aware that you use Liquid oxygen. Not only does the reservoir freezes up on me but so does the portable. Fortunately it “thaws” enough to use after about 20 mins. 🙂
Yes, it’s that portable that drives me nuts sometimes.
I’ve finally perfected the art of filling my liquid portable. Just stop filling when you see the liquid oxygen start spitting out of the reservoir. lol! Gotta be quick about it! I keep a 75lb reservoir tank in my van to refill my portable as well.
1. When your POC battery is dying and you forgot to bring an extra one with you while at school for a study session and you thought you wouldnt be there that long. Then you car charger and car is across campus. Had to call my mom and have her deliver me another battery to get home.
2. When you are flying home from vacation on your first trip on a plane using oxygen and you POC malfunctions and have to let the stewert know something is wrong. Luckly switching batteries helped make it work. Had to call the company the next day and replace it though.
3. When your oxygen tube catches on everything you walk by. Just have to laugh sometimes lol!
4. When your dogs think your oxygen tube is a leash! And they think they are going on a walk.
5. When the power went out and you have to switch over to the big oxygen tank and it doesn’t work. My brother fixed it half asleep lol!
I had to giggle about your number 3! That happens to me too all the time. It’s so frustrating, isn’t it? It’s amazing all the things that can go wrong when on oxygen.
LOL!! number 3, YAAAAssss!!! when you are just having one of those days and you are in the kitchen just trying to get dinner ready and that one last yank just sends you into a fury 😉
So so true Vanessa! haha!
I recently got “stuck” upstairs at an antique mall and ran out of oxygen with my spare tanks locked in my car….thank goodness I know the manager and he ran up stairs to get my car keys, got a tank, and brought it back up stairs to me! Or get to the grocery store to pick up what you needed for dinner and your valve on your replacement tank is hissing and loosing all your replacement tank oxygen – because a little disk valve thingy no one ever told you about had gone bad! Had to drive home with no oxygen and have my husband bring the inside the house concentrator line to my car! Sooo much fun!! 🙂
Oh NO! I’m glad you made it home ok! I’ve actually locked my keys in my car with it running while wanting to get autographs on K’s Dallas Stars jersey. I also locked the jersey in the car with my purse and cellphone. I was freaking out bad. Luckily the training center had a phone book and let me call a locksmith. I felt so stupid watching everyone else get autograph but I couldn’t. *sigh* I had to go back the next couple of days to get signatures. 🙂
This is such a great idea for a post! If you don’t mind, I’ll write my own “top 5” or “top 10” list and post a link to this entry. Glad to see you are safe and full of positivity!
That’s cool with me. 🙂
saying I don’t need my oxygen go out and fel short of breathe pulse ox down to 80 hard to accept new normal I guess stop being so bull headed
Kathy, I think we all start out as stubborn when oxygen use is new to us. Just don’t let your oxygen saturation get down so low! Yikes! *hugs*
Try to give your lungs a break. Wear the oxygen, silly. 😉
1. Having the POC battery charger go on the fritz just before I got on my return flight, resulting in me running out of O2 in the airport when I landed. (Never run out of O2 in an airport! They are not equipped to help!)
2. Having my liquid portable fall over during a very quiet art lecture at a museum. It made a very loud honking noise which made everyone in the room turn to look!
3. Having the wrong equipment delivered when traveling (this always seem to happen to me).
4. Running out of O2 when driving. Not fun.
5. Trying to convince your oxygen company that their is something wrong with their equipment and they don’t believe you.
Cindy, you are spot on with your top 5 list. I had to laugh when I read your # 2. I never knew I could move so fast to pick up my liquid oxygen portable when it falls over. Good grief… It sure screams loudly! Embarrassing! 😉 and your # 5 is soooo true. What a battle!
Thank you so much. I was reading all your post . you are inspiring. You are strong person. I am 36 years old who head heart problems. I use oxygen, almost year now. God bless you.
Hi Eden… I hoe you are doing better with your oxygen. Thank you for your kind words. *hugs* Stay sting and well.
Hello everyone 5 things OK
#1 I wouldn’t want to pee myself while I was out shopping
#2 Run out of liquid oxygen and have your spare be empty
#3 All my fill tanks are empty at the same time “ever happened thank the good Lord”
#4 You have liquid oxygen spit all over me ” that would burn”
#5 You get mad when the hose gets stuck that you pull so hard you break the fitting its hooked in and have know more
These are all really good Sandy. I’ve definitely had your #4 happen to me before and yes, it burns. 😉