i really enjoyed reading the article, too. and it's neat that denise dropped by to say hello!
i can relate to this obviously because i had a lot of this attitude in me when i was younger. i did everything possible to talk my docs out of IV antibiotics when i got sick. i now feel/know that i would not have lost as much lung funciton if i had been more aggressive back then. but i generally felt okay. cf was more of an inconvenience--something that i would think about every 3 months at my appointments and then sweep under the rug.
i didn't want to do the vest because that would be "caving into" CF; the flutter was much more incognito, so i used that; i did orals instead of IVs; i didn't take exercising seriously.
eventually i just couldn't do that anymore. i can't pinpoint the turning point, but i'm sure it had to do with growing up, moving out on my own, and seeing the results (hospitalizations) of my slack care. my fev1 has gone from 70 to 55 in the last 10 years since i've been at UNC. that's an incredible amount!! all that time i was "feeling okay" my functions were dwindling, probably never to return. (i can get up to 60 on a good day.) since i started exercising rigorously the last 3 years, my functions have stayed stable, thank god!
anyway, i guess what i'm saying is, it is normal to be like peter, but more than likely the time will come when you have to pay the price. there are far too few amy's of the world -- "mild" cystics that are extremely aggressive with airway clearance and cf treatment. but like the doctor in the article said, this is something we have to go through. we can only hope that we come out of our dreamland before too much reality has set in.
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