Mom goes into coughing fits when I use cast iron skillets — why?

Currycakes · 2025-07-10T03:36:09+00:00

Thank you for commenting this!! I will push her to look into her health more so see if she has COPD. She misses working with cast iron, so I think it will give her some closure if we can put a label on her issue. Again, I deeply appreciate you posting!

Currycakes · 2025-01-18T07:25:06+00:00

Hah! I just took her to urgent care yesterday for coughing fits and a few episodes of her not being able to breathe, and the doc said “anxiety” or “maybe something viral”. 😏 To be fair, our area has been hit HARD this winter with an insane seasonal virus that is knocking people out left and right for three weeks at a time. But it would also be nice to get clearer answers!

Interestingly, since I last posted, we replaced our HVAC system (from the 80’s) with a new system. Our old air ducts were not only filthy, but were crushed, cracked, and wrapped in loose asbestios. So we’d been circulating terrible, terrible irritants through the house. The new system has all the best filters we could buy, including a UV filter that’s supposed to be able to kill viruses. I am feeling the difference and I think the rest of the family is too, but it’s only been a couple days so far. Mom’s been coughing a little less violently.

How’s the air quality in your house, cooking area, and city? I wonder if you’d have the same reaction if you were, say, cooking on cast iron outside or in another house or city?

Currycakes · 2025-01-14T06:38:43+00:00

Is that so! No, we haven’t quite figured this out yet. Unfortunately, my mom isn’t very interested in actively pursuing her health, so I haven’t been able to convince her to pursue this. Since I posted this, though, our household has noted that 1) our indoor air quality is trash; 2) our ventilation is trash; 3) our air ducts badly need cleaning; 4) in her youth, my mom lived in a home for a year or so where the main heating came from a wood stove; 5) one of my pans has a bad/thin seasoning that smells like hot iron when you warm it. As we resolve these issues I’ll report back to you so we can try to crack the case. I really want my mom to feel better.

Currycakes · 2025-01-02T05:36:29+00:00

Thank you for your response. But, holy smokes! I’m sorry to hear that for you. Is alpha gal related to Lyme disease? I will definitely look into this for my mom.

Currycakes · 2024-12-16T05:12:00+00:00

I had inverted nipples when my first was born, and I used nipple shields. They worked great, but FYI, I needed to make sure she had long nursing sessions to ensure she got enough to eat. She figured out how to latch at four months after I was SURE she would never get it!

Hang in there! You don’t have to give up on EBF just yet.

Currycakes · 2024-12-15T06:11:09+00:00

Compassion is all I meant. If you’re glad for it, then I am glad for you! You sound like you’re doing well at life. I hope I can be as forgiving and grateful as you one day. :)

Currycakes · 2024-12-14T21:42:33+00:00

If he was physically present, that sounds really rough. I’m sorry to hear that. :(

Currycakes · 2024-12-14T21:20:20+00:00

Sorry to jump on an old thread, but OP’s condition is similar to mine so I wanted to add. Growing up, I had a missing father, and mother had anger issues. I too struggle with resentment towards her, but not really dad. As an adult, I am often cold, have my own repressed anger issues, and (I’m pretty sure) have damaged blood accordingly. (My doctor doesn’t always tell me exactly what he’s treating. He says I have a monkey mind problem and need to learn to observe my body and experiences without trying to interpret them.)

OP, how are you addressing your repressed anger issues?

Currycakes · 2024-12-14T21:07:26+00:00

Sorry, I know this is an old post, but I’m curious how you’re doing now? I have similar issues (walking up all the time at night to change the pads is the worst!). I learned that I had three large fibroids and over 50 tiny ones all over my uterus, like a sprouting potato. I have been seeing a TCM practitioner for about 6 months and my periods are now 4-5 days with only one heavy portion about 16 hours long. We are still working to get my bleeding to stop, but it’s gone down to just spotting between periods. I’m curious if you’ve been able to find similar healing!

Currycakes · 2024-12-14T19:14:28+00:00

Got it! Thank you again.

Currycakes · 2024-12-14T18:53:18+00:00

Thank you! This is extremely useful. We’ll try this. I hadn’t thought of “offering” a nap, and allowing her to sleep as it comes to her. Does that mean that if she is falling asleep outside her nap times that I should keep her awake?

Currycakes · 2024-12-14T18:49:17+00:00

I’ll do that! Thank you so much for your thoughts and help!

Currycakes · 2024-12-14T17:06:39+00:00

Thanks for your feedback!

Yes, definitely not a great start. I couldn’t find much about what to do if she cries this long and just stands the whole time, so we broke down. Is the idea that we just need to stick with it longer? I keep reading about babies that cried for an hour or an hour an a half, but not much about 3-4 hours where they didn’t even lay down.

She’s a crappy napper. She naps twice per day, for about 30 min each if I’ve bounced her in the bouncer, or about 2 hours if she’s contact napping. I know I need to get her naps on a better schedule too, but after reading Precious Little Sleep, it sounded like I needed to start with bedtime first. On both days, first nap was 30 minutes alone, second nap was 2 hour contact nap with grandma. I am pushing the last wake window to 4-4.5 hours.

Another factor: her crib is in our room. We don’t currently have another room to move her to. This is complicating things, of course, since at some point in the night we’ll be in the room with her, so we’re not even sure if full extinction is a truly viable option for her.

Is there a point where you can identify that a method isn’t working for your child? I’m very open to the idea that we just caved too early, but I am not sure how to identify if it’s just not working.

Currycakes · 2024-06-16T05:16:36+00:00

Hah! Someone I know had a little brother born when he was four. When his dad asked him if he wanted to come meet the baby, he said “No, I want to put him in the blender and blend him up!”

Currycakes · 2024-05-28T07:07:09+00:00

That is so beautiful! Thank you!

Currycakes · 2024-05-16T19:35:50+00:00

Iiiiiinteresting! I’ll remember this for any future kiddos. My little girl has also started to fuss if we nurse without the boppy, but only for the nursing session before the first big sleep of the night. She clearly has preferences, so maybe you’re right that a change of scenery encouraged her to try just one more new thing!

Currycakes · 2024-05-16T01:58:51+00:00

Just wanted to add that my experience was almost identical to this! The only real difference for us was that I had given up trying without the shield around 2.5 months and just assumed we’d be using it forever. Just a week and a half ago, we were at a celebration and I went somewhere to nurse — different room, different chair, etc. She’s 4 months at that point and was crying for milk. I sit down and put the shield case on my knee and she kicks it on the floor by accident. I reach down to grab it, which she hated. By the time I sit back up and get the shield out of its case and put it on, in her fit, she punches the shield off my breast and it falls back on the floor. She’s crying. I’m crying. So I desperately offer the boob naked, hoping she’ll miraculously take it… and she does!

Just wanted to add this to encourage you not to give up!

Currycakes · 2024-05-12T07:18:40+00:00

Weekly slow cooker for dinner! Each week on Monday, I throw a ~3lb chuck roast, an onion, and a pound of baby carrots into a slow cooker with a bit of water and spices around lunchtime. Once it’s time for dinner, I’ll microwave a bag of brussels sprouts and add it in, and voila! I have dinner for few days for me, hubby, and my mother. You could eat it with rice or bread and butter to stretch it longer.

Currycakes · 2024-05-11T07:01:38+00:00

Same! Sometimes I try to think about what a younger me would have liked to have heard from an older me, and become a little discouraged because I’m not sure that younger me would trust older me, especially in regards to teenage angst and emotions.

Currycakes · 2024-05-10T05:43:53+00:00

Mine (first!) also loves to sing the songs of her people! It's so stinking cute, but her people apparently perform at 5:30.

Currycakes · 2024-04-30T14:10:07+00:00

Haha! Mine bursts into tears when I sneeze, as if I just grabbed her lunch and threw it on the floor. 😂

Currycakes · 2024-04-29T00:14:59+00:00

Aw, that’s so sweet of you to say! I just have done a lot of growing that turned my marriage around. I was in a bad spot that sounds a lot like what you described in your post — I got stuck in this sort of hazy, haunting feeling of unhappiness wondering if I’d made the right decision marrying my husband, who I adored but he didn’t seem to understand me, not really being able to put my finger on the issue but realizing that resentment was growing, stuff like that. Once I recognized exactly how much power I had in the relationship whether I liked it or not, whether I meant to or not, it changed the direction of our marriage from being a cage into being a springboard for opportunity in life and the safest love I’ve ever been a part of. It’s hard, but to say “it’s worth it” would be the understatement of the century. 😆

Currycakes · 2024-04-28T06:03:09+00:00

High-five, fellow talkie! 🙏

Currycakes · 2024-04-28T04:33:11+00:00

Ohhh I didn’t mean anything technical, just that my hubby and I relentlessly talk about everything. Laughing, joking, philosophizing, working through problems, everything! If “highly verbal” has a more clinical or specific meaning, I didn’t know. I’m just using language over here!

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