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Letter: Acclimate to Wearing N95 Masks!
Dear Prepper Friends and Family,
As someone who sleeps with a CPAP machine running every night I’ve grown accustomed to the strangeness of having a mask on my face. Even more so, when I exhale the mask fills with hot breath and it feels as if I’m suffocating. When I inhale, however, I get clean, fresh air and it’s all okay. But I had to train myself to not struggle with it.
We’re all going to run into this situation with N-95 filter masks if and when the time comes to wear them whenever we go out in public, to protect ourselves from catching this COVID-19 virus. Wearing these masks gets uncomfortable p-r-e-t-t-y fast. The inside of the mask fills with hot / humid air, and then when you inhale you get fresh, cool air. (It’s worse with masks that don’t have an exhalation valve!)
My advice to you would be to pick one of your masks (hopefully you have a decent supply) and try wearing it. Start out for short periods of time, maybe just a minute while you’re watching television or reading a book (something not requiring physical exertion!). Then work your way up to wearing a mask for 15 -to- 20 minutes, the amount of time you might have to wear it to go into a store to make a purchase once the virus turns up in our communities.
You can’t be taking the mask off when the danger is high, just because you’re uncomfortable. Some of you might have a strong reaction to wearing a mask and having the suffocation feeling. You need to work through that, get used to it, train yourself that it’s okay.
You can’t be fiddling with the mask, or cheating by lifting it to get a breath of “fresh air.” If there’s really a virus danger the outside of the mask will have hundreds if not thousands of virus particles stuck to it and disturbing them will be a bad idea.
Don’t forget that this virus has proven itself to be extremely contagious (even contagious disease experts have gotten themselves infected!). And that the CDC has just recently agreed that asymptomatic carriers are a real thing. The people around you might have few mild symptoms or no symptoms at all, but still be able to spread the infection. You just won’t know.
The N-95 masks are simple, fairly foolproof (nothing is “foolproof” because fools are so clever), and effective. So when the time comes it’s a smart thing to use. Please don’t settle for anything less than a mask officially rated at N-95 or N-100.
Don’t wait until the last minute to have a mask supply, and don’t wait until the last minute to acclimate yourselves to the strangeness of wearing one!
Trust God. Be prepared. We can do both!
ShepherdFarmerGeek
*He makes very good points. If you have masks but you are not used to them and have never worked with one for an extended period of time you need to train with it. In the military we trained in our gear all the time and he makes a good point about feeling claustrophobic or a suffocating feeling if your not used to wearing a respirator N95 type mask. Take one and do some daily chores with it and try to wear it for an hour or two. It is something you have to get used to. HF
Dear Prepper Friends and Family,
As someone who sleeps with a CPAP machine running every night I’ve grown accustomed to the strangeness of having a mask on my face. Even more so, when I exhale the mask fills with hot breath and it feels as if I’m suffocating. When I inhale, however, I get clean, fresh air and it’s all okay. But I had to train myself to not struggle with it.
We’re all going to run into this situation with N-95 filter masks if and when the time comes to wear them whenever we go out in public, to protect ourselves from catching this COVID-19 virus. Wearing these masks gets uncomfortable p-r-e-t-t-y fast. The inside of the mask fills with hot / humid air, and then when you inhale you get fresh, cool air. (It’s worse with masks that don’t have an exhalation valve!)
My advice to you would be to pick one of your masks (hopefully you have a decent supply) and try wearing it. Start out for short periods of time, maybe just a minute while you’re watching television or reading a book (something not requiring physical exertion!). Then work your way up to wearing a mask for 15 -to- 20 minutes, the amount of time you might have to wear it to go into a store to make a purchase once the virus turns up in our communities.
You can’t be taking the mask off when the danger is high, just because you’re uncomfortable. Some of you might have a strong reaction to wearing a mask and having the suffocation feeling. You need to work through that, get used to it, train yourself that it’s okay.
You can’t be fiddling with the mask, or cheating by lifting it to get a breath of “fresh air.” If there’s really a virus danger the outside of the mask will have hundreds if not thousands of virus particles stuck to it and disturbing them will be a bad idea.
Don’t forget that this virus has proven itself to be extremely contagious (even contagious disease experts have gotten themselves infected!). And that the CDC has just recently agreed that asymptomatic carriers are a real thing. The people around you might have few mild symptoms or no symptoms at all, but still be able to spread the infection. You just won’t know.
The N-95 masks are simple, fairly foolproof (nothing is “foolproof” because fools are so clever), and effective. So when the time comes it’s a smart thing to use. Please don’t settle for anything less than a mask officially rated at N-95 or N-100.
Don’t wait until the last minute to have a mask supply, and don’t wait until the last minute to acclimate yourselves to the strangeness of wearing one!
Trust God. Be prepared. We can do both!
ShepherdFarmerGeek
*He makes very good points. If you have masks but you are not used to them and have never worked with one for an extended period of time you need to train with it. In the military we trained in our gear all the time and he makes a good point about feeling claustrophobic or a suffocating feeling if your not used to wearing a respirator N95 type mask. Take one and do some daily chores with it and try to wear it for an hour or two. It is something you have to get used to. HF