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The Sweet Scent of Clean Air The Sweet Scent of Clean AirMy nose is running like my bathtub tap, which my landlord has neglected to fix for the past 5 months. My eyes water as I sneeze hard enough to pull muscles and dislocate ribs from my sternum. My sinuses are being stabbed with coat hangers and a sinus headache is starting a wild tap-dance number in my skull. My voice ranges from hoarse to non-existent as my vocal cords are clogged with clinging mucus. And worst of all: the swelling throat, the constricting airways, the wracking coughs that contort my body into an air-starved pretzel. Is it cold season? Is it the dreaded SARS bug? Nope. Guess again. Give up? It's perfume. Some idiot yet again blithely wandered in to our specifically scent free office wearing perfume. It happens every day. In they strut with not a care in the world, doused in the most toxic of substances. Gaily they spritz on litre after litre of malodorous mixture, fouling the very air with their presence. The scent so heavily applied lingers in the air to plague my breathing for hours after they depart, all unknowingly. Yes, perhaps I should live in a bubble, but not me alone. With the numbers of asthmatics and allergies climbing by the minute I am boggled by the obliviousness of most of the population to this problem. Picture the layout of your typical department store. As you walk in the main entrance and what is the first thing that assaults your senses? That's it, the perfume counters: taking up as much as half of the main level of most department stores, it is impossible to reach the other shopping areas without passing through this bog of stench. As I hold my breath to dash through, the attendants gaily cry "Would you like a sample?", not realizing the torture that their job inflicts on me. It's not just stores though. I spent 9 years in a choir, which I left partly for health reasons. In my first year I was finally diagnosed with asthma, and not a minute too soon. On my first tour I entered a change room where the air was thick with hairspray. This triggered my first full-blown "are we going to have to take you to hospital" attack. I was left both exhausted and embarrassed by this experience. I had no voice for 2 full days after the attack (which is a huge problem on a choral tour) and my poor battered immune system wasn�t able to fight off the next bug that came along which developed into a bacterial infection in my lungs and throat. The next year, hairspray was banned for all concerts and tours. Each year my reactions worsened. Perfume and cologne were banned. Then hand cream and static guard. One year I was forced to flee every rehearsal for an entire term, so strong was my reaction to a particular person's perfume. I eventually discovered who it was by accident when I hugged her and my face immediately swelled up. I reacted to more and more brands and varieties with worsening severity. More than once I got up in front of the choir and begged them to please stop hurting me like this. Please try to remember not to put on perfume on rehearsal days. Please don't put on fresh hand cream in the middle of rehearsal. I supplied unscented hand cream for the entire choir my last tour and I continue to do so in the office where I work. I know that this is a difficult concept for people to understand. There are 4 of us with this problem in office and still our co-workers will arrive scented. Many people don't believe the reactions are real, they think that it's an attention grab. They test what they can get away with and when it varies they assume that I'm faking it. Well, what they don't realize is that the reactions will vary between brands and sources of scent, volume, amount of fresh air, exposure to other scented product or other chemicals, amount of medication and general health. Also things like potpourri, scented candles, dryer sheets, gels and mousses, strong chemicals and lubricants, soaps, shampoos and conditioners complicate the whole issue. Many people don't realize that "original" hand cream still has a scent: the only safe ones are unscented. My friends try to remember to be scent free when they're around me. I know that many of them consider the "will this kill Canoegirl" factor. I'm lucky to work in a scent free office, the person who fought for this designation has moved on but the designation stayed for others and myself. Bear is very considerate about what he uses, and he remembers almost at all times. Worst of all is the embarrassment. I'm shy by nature and I hate to ask people to change to accommodate me. Often I will suffer in silence until I am forced to flee. I feel like such a bitch saying: you can't wear this and you can't use that and you need to change because of me. I HATE IT!!! I don't want to miss out on all the parties and gatherings. I just want to be able to breathe. I get sick so often and have so many reactions that my doctor classes me as immuno-compromised. Some of my medications exacerbate this state. I'm starting to get infections and problems that are only found in the very young, the elderly and the immuno-compromised. I get bronchitis several times each year and each time the dosage of medication required to beat it increases. I'm on cortico-steroids and would really rather not be. The coughing causes my delicately balanced ribcage to unbalance, dislocating as many as a dozen ribs at a time. How did someone who used to be so healthy end up like this? Please, PLEASE, for the love of all that is holy: the next time you get out a bottle of perfume, or grab the hairspray, think of my poor battered and bleeding lungs, my abused immune system, and put the bottle down. You smell just lovely as you are. 2003-10-16 || 4:33 p.m. |
