About Kathleen MacNaughton Expertise As a registered nurse and health educator, as well as a person living with nasal allergies, eczema, allergic asthma, and eye allergies, I can answer questions related to allergy symptoms, triggers, diagnosis, and treatment.
Experience I have lived with severe nasal, eye, and skin allergies all of my life. I also have allergic asthma. In addition, I have been an RN for more than 30 years and have spent the last 10 years as a consumer health educator, both offline and online, specializing in the areas of allergies and asthma.
Publications About.com (asthma), HealthCentral.com (asthma and allergy networks), RhinocortAqua.com, EverydayKidz.com
Education/Credentials Bachelor of Science degree in Nursing from Syracuse University.
Question Hi, first of all i want to thank you for taking the time to read each of our questions. I'm going to try to be as specific as possible. I'm 21 years old and i"i've been overweight almost all my life but never as overweight as I am right now. I weight 195 lb and only 5'2,so yes i know I'm really overweight. i don't smoke i don't drink , i've had asthma since i was 3 but it suddenly stopped when i was 14, my allergies when away too,but they came back a couple months ago. my problem right now is that i've been getting this days when i just cant breath properly and i feel the need to take deep breaths very often to the point that my chest start hurting every time i take the deep breaths , the next day (today) i feel this pain in my left lung thats there all the time but gets more painful when i take deep breaths ( even though today i don't need those as much as yesterday) also got a pain on my right arm ( i don't think has nothing to do with it, but just letting you know). this is the 3rd time this happens to me, the last time was like 2 months ago. on my last visit to the doctor ( 6 months ago) she told me my cholesterol levels were too high , could that be the reason? or what else could it be? what can i do about it?? i really hope you could understand my symptoms. thanks again.
Answer Andrea,
I wish I could give you a more exact answer, but that's just hard to do over the Internet. Of course, you know that being overweight is probably contributing immensely to your health problems. It could be that some of your problems breathing are because your diaphragm can't expand enough.
But... the pain on inspiration makes me think there is more going on, such as pleurisy, which is an inflammation of the lining around the lungs. Obesity also increases the risk of asthma and heart disease, which includes high cholesterol.
I would encourage you to revisit the doctor to discuss your latest symptoms and also to get help with getting your weight into a healthier range. You are too young to be facing such health risks. So take some positive action for yourself so that you can live the life you want, OK?
