ALRIGHT BITCHES Matsu asthma thoughts comin atcha because my brain is the smoothest!!
so big idea is that pretty much all of them deal with it, because it seems there’s a kind of genetic component, so it’d be weird if only Choro had asthma out of six people for a condition with a genetic factor
(and because I’m a ho, all six of them get to have it ufufufu)
well, we have Osomatsu, who hasn’t had a real asthma attack since freaking high school, it’s probably less intense for him out of all the others. he doesn’t have to use a maintenance inhaler, and his asthma is so mild he often doesn’t even think about bringing his rescue inhaler with him when he leaves the house. (the prescription is always current, he hasn’t kept the same inhaler for like seven years, but you’d be forgiven for thinking he might because he’s gross.) his biggest trigger is artificial scents, and it’s only when he almost chokes to death on his date’s perfume that he realizes that maybe he should start carrying his rescue inhaler, because he came really close to passing out from not being able to breathe. maybe the good thing is that he only needs to learn this lesson once for it to stick.
then there’s Karamatsu, who’s faring okay, he usually has one bad attack every year or two, the rest of the time his daily maintenance inhaler usually prevents things from getting too bad. he does keep his rescue inhaler on him most of the time, except of course when his outfit prevents it. (he has to suffer a little for his art, right? what a dummy.) his weakness is cold air, it makes his chest incredibly tight, though thankfully it takes air that’s below freezing before it starts to get bad. he takes a hit from his rescue inhaler as soon as he feels the wheezing start, so most of the time he manages well. it only slips his mind when he wakes up in the middle of an icy winter night, gasping for air, suddenly realizing that he forgot his maintenance dose that morning. he lies awake coughing for a while, with Osomatsu rubbing his back, but he never makes that mistake again.
Choromatsu is the one everyone is most concerned about with regard to asthma, because it used to be nightmarish during his last year of high school and the year after that. it seemed like everything set him off, and although he’s not having severe attacks on a daily, weekly, or even monthly basis anymore, he’s still among the most sensitive to every single thing that triggers the rest of them. he’s a very good boy in that he always takes his maintenance dose and always has his rescue inhaler on him when he’s out, though. the most frequent thing that sets him off now is allergies; particularly, the worst one for him is cats, but it typically takes a combination of strong allergens to throw him into a full-on asthma attack. and although he’s pretty good at knowing his limits, accidents do happen.
Ichimatsu suffered in silence for the year or so following high school graduation, because his asthma started to actually bloom in the last month or so of their last year. he mistook it for just his allergies being unseasonably bad, because during the summer following graduation, and every spring and summer after, they were all coughing and sneezing like crazy. it was really only when Matsuyo noticed that Ichimatsu was wheezing a lot when he caught colds or when Matsuzo came in from smoking that someone connected the dots that Ichimatsu had developed asthma too. he’s done okay on a maintenance inhaler, though he often forgets his rescue inhaler simply due to being careless. he tends to get asthma attacks when he’s sick more than any other time, and when he’s sick, he never forgets to have his rescue inhaler on hand because he knows attacks are inevitable when he’s sick.
and you wouldn’t think that Jyushimatsu has asthma, because he’s so physically active, how could he?? the truth is that it’s less severe for him because he’s so active, between the physical activity combined with his maintenance inhaler, he’s sort of trained his lungs to ‘deal with it’, the same way he’s trained his muscles to ‘deal with’ the stress of exercise. he was able to slowly wean off the maintenance inhaler, so he doesn’t use it anymore, but he still has a rescue inhaler just in case. he’s pretty good about carrying it despite thinking he doesn’t need it. he has small attacks every few months or so, but similar to Karamatsu, typically a puff from his rescue inhaler fixes things quickly so it never gets too bad. stress is the worst thing for his asthma, as is excessive exercise, as in too far for even him. his asthma attacks are also the most... scary? it’s disturbing to see someone so full of life of energy and go-go-go unable to get a decent breath in.
Totty is the baby, of course, so everyone jokes about him ‘having to do everything his big brothers do’, including asthma. his only really started to emerge in the last few years, with a ton of wheezing and coughing when the pollen count gets really high, and the utter lack of control when it feels like something pressing down on his chest terrifies him. he’s currently trying to find which maintenance inhaler is going to work best for him; he’s tried two so far that have barely helped. he has a rescue inhaler that works wonders once his chest starts feeling tight, though thankfully allergy medication helps a lot in keeping the pollen from getting to him, and if his allergy symptoms don’t get a chance to get too bad, he can usually manage the little bit of asthma. his rescue inhaler is attached to his hip even moreso than his phone, whether he’s at home or out somewhere. if he does have a bad attack, everyone is immediately swarming him to help, just as they would the others... it’s just that when the baby of the family starts wheezing and hacking, everyone is on high alert in .2 seconds.
maybe she says, as if I wouldn't be ALL OVER this concept with my grubby lil hands XD
as someone with asthma myself (though not nearly as bad as Choro's, I only have a rescue inhaler and am not on any maintenance medication for it) I drew on my own experiences and maybe intensified them a little to make my boy suffer!
leans a bit toward allergies being a big trigger for Choro, but other stuff as well! (I'm just an allergy whore, allergies and asthma often show up as a duet, and allergies can be a significant asthmatic trigger)
... and as someone who also suffers from anxiety, definitely the bits about working oneself up into making an asthma attack worse because of anxiety are as real as it gets, babes, I can testify 😎
anyways this is kinda Allmatsu but definitely has a Wakaba spin because I haven't written Wakaba in a while!
I hope it makes ur asthmatic Choro dreams come true 💚
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As it stands, Choromatsu’s asthma at the moment could be so much worse than it is, and he’s grateful for that.
After all, especially during his last year of high school and the year immediately following, it was bad. A high pollen count could have him taking hits from his rescue inhaler off and on for the entire day thanks to his allergies, even while hiding indoors. A particularly vigorous exercise during physical education could throw him into an asthma attack so bad it led to an anxiety attack because he couldn’t breathe. It’s taken a few years of using a maintenance inhaler, and some work trying to avoid excessive amounts of his triggers, but finally it’s less intense than it used to be.
Getting it under control has made life so much easier. He can go outside without worrying too much about the pollen. He can tolerate Ichimatsu’s cats in the house. Cold air doesn’t freeze his lungs. The linger of cigarette smoke when he hugs his father doesn’t leave him coughing for the rest of the day. He can run short distances and not be paranoid about having trouble breathing afterwards. He doesn’t have to panic that a simple cold will literally take his breath away.
The most problematic thing is that there is such a concept as the perfect storm, and it seems that Choromatsu is overdue to be suffering.
He knew the pollen count was high when he woke up to most of his brothers sneezing, as well as doing some himself. No big deal, Mom made sure they all got some allergy medicine at breakfast, and most of the time it does the trick. It’s probably the wind blowing pollen around, making them all a little miserable.
Thankfully, though, everyone is feeling much better by lunch, although it starts to rain without much warning. The house feels icy; although the rain is more a gentle storm than an outright downpour, the temperature has dropped a bit. All the brothers start to shiver, so once they’ve eaten, all of them except Ichimatsu gravitate toward the spare room. A chilly, rainy day means they all snuggle up with each other, watch movies, and probably doze off.
Ichimatsu, on the other hand, slips out briefly to check on his cats in the alley. He pulls his hood up and says he’ll be back in like twenty minutes; his deadpan delivery of, “Start the movie and I’ll be back before anything important happens” makes them chuckle, because, well, that’s Ichimatsu.
Despite the fact that he hasn’t been feeling too badly up until now, the cold air is starting to creep into Choromatsu’s chest. Being hit with this and hayfever is like a double whammy for his asthma, so his hope is that if he warms up a little, he might be able to avoid feeling worse.
He can’t help the anxiety that starts to kick in as he settles in under a couple blankets with Jyushimatsu. How long has it been since the last time he had an asthma attack? Months,he’s pretty sure. Maybe a year or more since he had one that was bad enough to scare him.
Shit… where’s my rescue inhaler…?
Obviously he took his daily dose from the maintenance inhaler this morning, as he does every morning, to lessen the likelihood of an attack. However, he still has the prescription for his rescue inhaler, though, just in case he does have an attack.
And although he puts the rescue inhaler in his pocket when he leaves the house, when he’s just hanging around inside, he doesn’t keep it on his person. It’s probably in the drawer of the bedside table in their bedroom, he thinks. He wasn’t out in town or anything yesterday, so he didn’t take it out. He didn’t even think about touching it yesterday… so… it should be there.
He tries his best to shove those thoughts down. It doesn’t matter where his rescue inhaler is, because he’s not going to need it, because he’s not going to have an asthma attack. All he needs is to calm down and not get himself worked up about it. Getting anxious makes everything a million times worse. He just… needs to cuddle up and let his little brother’s body heat seep into him. Once he’s warm, the tightness in his chest will go away and everything will be fine.
So he leans toward Jyushimatsu, who laughs before pressing himself in against Choromatsu. “Choromatsu-nii-san! Osomatsu-nii-san found that old rom-com you used to really like in high school! We wanna watch that first!”
“O-oh…” … Oh. He remembers that movie being incredibly cheesy, no matter how sweet it seemed when he was a hopeless teenager daydreaming of true love. Still, if everyone else wants to watch it, who is he to say no? “Yeah, that… that sounds good. Here, let’s just try to get comfortable…”
A string of coughs escapes as he puts an arm around Jyushimatsu. It’s not that bad, it doesn’t feel like he can’t breathe… he’ll feel better when he gets warmer. It makes him wince a bit all the same.
“Aaah?” Jyushimatsu is only too happy to nuzzle into the contact, but he tilts his head up. “Hey?? Are you okay, Choromatsu-nii-san? Are you getting sick?”
He quickly shakes his head and swallows. “No, no… I-I’m fine. Sorry. The cold air is just, you know, m-making my chest feel a little tight.”
His little brother immediately rubs his head against Choromatsu’s chest, as if that’s going to be any help at all. “Do you need your backup inhaler thing? I can go get it!”
“No… I-I think I’ll be okay. Don’t worry, Jyushimatsu.” He has to admit, though, having someone so close feels nice. “Just… help me warm up, haha.”
And of course, the eager-to-please fifth eldest takes the job very seriously. He cozies up to Choromatsu almost like an affectionate puppy, and one of his arms slips around to pat his older brother’s back.
It makes Choromatsu feel slightly better; at the very least, a little more relaxed. Sometimes if he can keep his anxiety down and he doesn’t whip himself into a frenzy, a potential asthma attack flickers out of existence before it even happens.
So he tries to breathe normally, focusing on that and the movie to distract him from the anxiety. Almost as soon as it starts, he finds that he can practically recite every line verbatim. Wow, how many times did I watch this in high school?? Like every afternoon? As silly as it is, he actually enjoys it just as much as he did when he was younger ― it’s almost like a comfort film.
Just as the plot is starting to get underway, the door to the room opens. In comes Ichimatsu… carrying ESP Kitty. “Hey, guys. ESP Kitty’s gonna camp out here for the night. I think he wants to be inside with us.”
“Woooow, you can tell??” Jyushimatsu marvels at that, clearly impressed by what he might think of as Ichimatsu ‘speaking cat’, rather than Ichimatsu just wanting one of his favorite cats inside while it’s raining. “Come sit by us, then! I wanna pet him!”
Ichimatsu shrugs before coming over and sitting next to Jyushimatsu. As soon as he does, ESP Kitty mewls and hops into Jyushimatsu’s blanket-covered lap. He starts to pet the cat enthusiastically, rubbing between his ears and giggling when it earns him a happy purr.
The fourth eldest turns to the screen, then scoffs as he reaches for a handful of popcorn. “Told you I’d be back before anything important happened. Is this that dumb scene with the roses and shit?”
“I-it’s not dumb,” Choromatsu huffs, if only to cover up his mounting panic. The pollen he could deal with. Even the cold air would probably be okay. But pollen, cold air, and a cat sitting less than 20 centimeters away from him? He was already starting to feel a bit out of breath before ESP Kitty joined them; he can’t imagine this is going to go any way other than bad.
“Tch, whatever. No accounting for taste, I guess.” Ichimatsu pauses. “… Uh. Cold air getting to you?”
Choromatsu frowns, suddenly feeling self-conscious. Is his breathing starting to get audibly crappy? “Um… that and… and allergies.”
“Mh.” It doesn’t seem to hit Ichimatsu why his brother chose to say allergies instead of hayfever. “They were bugging me earlier too. Do you need someone to go get your inhaler?”
“No… i-it’s not that bad right now.” Why is he even saying that? Why can’t he just ask Ichimatsu to move ESP Kitty out of the room because he’s worried that a triple threat is going to trigger an asthma attack? Why is he like this?
Why don’t any of the others realize just how bad this day has been for his stupid lungs? Is it just because none of them have asthma so they don’t think about it like he does? Even Jyushimatsu, who was the first one to notice that Choromatsu might be having a flare-up, seems not to recognize that having a cat so close in addition to the other things is going to be a problem.
Now that the anxiety has come back for an encore, and there’s one more added trigger in the mix, he doesn’t really last too long. He does his best to lean back a bit from Jyushimatsu in an attempt to put distance between himself and ESP Kitty… and it doesn’t work, predictably. Allergies and asthma don’t work like that, and anxiety especially doesn’t work like that.
His chest starts to feel tight again. Another handful of coughs is muffled into the crook of his elbow. When he tries to breathe, it’s beginning to feel like he’s trying to breathe through a straw. It’s like something heavy is sitting on his chest, refusing to let his lungs get a good breath in.
None of his insistence that it’s not going to happen, none of his efforts to divert his attention, work anymore. Gradually it becomes harder and harder to draw any air in. Even though he’s getting better at having power over his anxiety, that mental strength just doesn’t apply when it comes to allergies and asthma.
All things being equal, he’s pretty helpless in the face of an impending asthma attack. It’s not something he can ‘talk himself down’ from like he sometimes can with an anxiety attack.
What gets his brothers’ attention is likely the sound of Choromatsu coughing even more, coupled with the sound of him wheezing as he tries desperately to get a decent breath in. The wheezing is a sound that, as soon as they hear it, throws them all into high-alert mode, because it’s the hallmark of him having trouble breathing.
Being so close, Jyushimatsu notices it first, giving a couple of pats to Choromatsu’s back. His initial line of thought is probably that it might be just a brief coughing fit from the cold air or getting a tickle in his throat or something; a few firm thumps to the back usually helps clear something like that. Not this time. “Choromatsu-nii-san!! You’re having trouble breathing?”
It’s hard to talk, but he manages to get out a quiet, squeaky answer of, “Y-yeah, I… think I’m… h-having an asthma attack…” More coughing follows, and he’s willing his lungs to get something in, anything, anything better than this. It feels like as soon as he takes a breath he’s taking another, and another, and another, like his own body is trying to smother him.
That’s when everyone else turns almost comically in sync to look at him. Those are the words that always make the rest of his brothers sit up and take notice, “I’m having an asthma attack,” especially when he struggles to even say them.
Once it’s clicked for the others, Ichimatsu is quick to get to his feet, grabbing ESP Kitty from Jyushimatsu’s lap. “Shit, Choromatsu… I forgot you’re allergic. Let me move ESP Kitty downstairs.”
“Where’s your emergency inhaler?” Osomatsu is up in an instant as well, heading for the door along with Ichimatsu. “Do you have it? Or is it in the drawer in the bedroom?”
Still wheezing, and starting to panic a little, all Choromatsu can do is nod. “In… in the drawer…”
More coughs bubble up as his airway tightens more. His eyes are starting to water, and through a film of tears he can see Karamatsu following the others. “Drinking ice water helps you sometimes too, right? I’ll go get a glass.”
“Y… yeah… okay…”
Every word is like a gamble, because speaking uses up precious air that he’s not getting enough of right now. It feels like his lungs are barely pulling anything in, like something is compressing his chest. It’s almost like drowning on dry land.
“Aaaah, Choromatsu-nii-san…” He thinks Totty is up as well now, going for the door. “I think I read somewhere that caffeine can help asthma symptoms! Karamatsu-nii-san is bringing ice water, but, I’ll go make some coffee for you too.”
Everyone is trying so hard to help him, and frustratingly enough is that Choromatsu can’t really help himself. If he had his inhaler right here in his pocket or something, he could have used it as soon as he started having real trouble breathing. Instead, he hasn’t had a severe attack in so long, he got a little complacent. He forgot that it could bethis bad.
Jyushimatsu has taken his hoodie off, leaving him in just a plain white T-shirt, seeming to understand that if he wants to be near Choromatsu right now, he needs to ditch the clothing with cat hair all over it. “Aaah, Choromatsu-nii-san…?? It’s okay… Osomatsu-nii-san is gonna be back with your inhaler in a couple seconds! It’s gonna be okay!”
By this point Choromatsu can feel his face starting to turn red from the effort it’s taking to get half a breath in. He can’t stop coughing. His chest hurts. Every almost-breath ends with noisy wheezing.
He’s glad Jyushimatsu is here and trying to keep him from getting any more panicky, at least… if he works himself into an anxiety attack over not being able to breathe, it’s going to turn into a self-fulfilling prophecy. He doesn’t stay calm and the only thing he can look forward to is a trip to the hospital.
Just as he’s closing his eyes and leaning in against Jyushimatsu, there’s a clamor of frantic footsteps coming back into the room. For whatever reason, even through the oxygen-deprived haze and anxiety, he can tell they belong to his oldest brother. “I got it! Choromatsu! Shit… how does this thing work, again? I just put it in his mouth and push down on the top??”
“No… there’s a cap on it, nii-san, you have to take that off. And you have to shake it up first. Mmmmm, here, lemme do it! I got it, I got it.” There’s a telltale pop, the rattling of the inhaler being shaken, then Choromatsu feels himself being jostled around a bit. “Here, Choro-nii-san. We got your medicine, so open up!”
Before he can even really focus on doing so, the mouthpiece of the inhaler is pressed between his lips. “Okay, I’m gonna press down on the top, and when I do that, try to breathe in!”
Choromatsu can recall doing this countless times throughout his last year of high school, and the year after, and frequently in the years following. It’s practically second nature to inhale as deeply as he can as soon as he feels the aerosolized medication mist into his mouth.
With some level of practiced perfection, he holds his breath as long as he can, letting the medicine travel its way down to his lungs. One puff is usually sufficient to open things up enough so he no longer feels like he’s in danger of suffocating. He feels his face getting a bit less red and hot, and he’s able to gasp in a nearly complete breath.
Osomatsu’s hand is rubbing his back gently. “How’s that, Choro? Can you breathe okay?”
He nods, taking in another breath. Thank God, the tightness is starting to go away a little bit. “B… better. Oh, my God.” Several more coughs force their way out, and he weakly reaches up to take his inhaler from Jyushimatsu. “H-here… I think I can… do it myself now. Pretty sure I… I need another hit.”
“Okay!” The inhaler is carefully shoved into his hand, and even though he’s said he can do it himself, Jyushimatsu tries to help raise his hand up to his mouth. It makes Choromatsu chuckle a little, which turns into another couple of coughs.
With that, the process repeats, breathing in the medicine with the second puff. As soon as it hits his lungs, he starts feeling much better.
Around that time is when Karamatsu returns, sitting down in front of them and handing over a glass that’s probably more ice than water. “Ah,thank goodness you got your medication, brother. Here… drink this, it should help even more.”
“Thanks, Kara.” His hands are always a bit shaky after using the rescue inhaler, some side effect, so he’s cautious as he brings it to his lips to drink. “I-I didn’t mean to scare you guys…”
Osomatsu shifts his hand up to run through Choromatsu’s hair, while Jyushimatsu takes over rubbing his back. “What the hell even happened? You haven’t had an attack like that in a long time. Was it ‘cause the pollen count is high today? Then you should’ve felt better after we took our allergy meds…”
“But then it got really cold when it started raining,” Jyushimatsu points out. “The cold air was bothering him.”
Karamatsu hums. “And then Ichimatsu brought ESP Kitty inside, sitting very close to Choromatsu.”
Jyushimatsu nuzzles against Choromatsu’s shoulder. “Three strikes and nii-san’s out!”
“Oof, that’s right,” Osomatsu pouts. “No wonder you had an attack with all that going on. Sorry we didn’t notice sooner.”
Choromatsu shakes his head and goes to take another hit from the inhaler. He’s really only supposed to do it twice, but he uses it so rarely, the doctor has told him a third puff if he thinks he needs it is okay as long as he doesn’t make a habit of it. “Y-you don’t have to be sorry. I was… starting to feel a little short of breath after lunch, but… I didn’t say anything. I-I didn’t think it was that bad.”
He takes another few sips of the water, sighing in relief when he feels like he can breathe almost totally fine again. “I… should have gone to get my inhaler… when my chest started to feel tight. Then Ichimatsu came in with ESP Kitty and… that k-kind of… pushed everything over the edge. But I… I think I’m okay now.”
“Do you need us to do anything else?” Jyushimatsu moves around so he can lie down in his big brother’s lap. “We’ll take really good care of you!”
He laughs softly, and feels his anxiety quiet down to a low murmur in the background when it doesn’t make him cough. “No… that’s okay. I-I feel a lot better. Totty’s making some coffee, and that should help keep me from having another attack. Plus I’ll keep my inhaler close, just in case.”
With that, he tucks the inhaler into his pocket and sets a hand against Jyushimatsu’s head, leaning his own on Osomatsu’s shoulder. “Thanks. Once Ichimatsu and Totty are back… h-how about we just finish the movie? It’s, um… almost to the really good part, so we should… rewind it a little.”
Jyushimatsu offers one of his typical boisterous laughs. “Ahahah! Choromatsu-nii-san is back to normal!”
“Y-yeah…” Choromatsu scrapes up a smile of his own and takes another sip of water. “Thanks to you guys.”
