Masked Life Q&A: Relationships, Communication, and, How Does it Sound?

I’m sending this post out for all my MCS brothers and sisters who are strong enough to wear their respirator masks out in public so as to protect their health. Today, TashaLee from Fruitful Healthy Living will share with us what it’s like to communicate while wearing a respirator mask, and how it sounds. (I have a hard enough time wearing the 3M type of mask, and I’ve only ever worn my Sundstrom respirator in traffic and bushfire smoke, but, in the interest of protecting my health, I won’t rule out using it for avoiding exposures to the chemical irritants to which I’m sensitive to.

The topic of communication is an interesting one for me because I once considered wearing the respirator mask to classes. Luckily, it never came to that. But I would never rule out wearing it out in public because I refuse to be denied access to goods and services (I just send someone else to the shops, yeah?) because other people are wearing personal care products containing solvents, petrochemicals and fragrances into shared public spaces. It’s a disability recognised by the Disability Act and Human Rights but also a disability that’s often not recognised by people offering goods and services. If it was, most of us wouldn’t need to wear a friggen mask to go to these places!)

TashaLee can be found sometimes sleeping in hers, due to having to avoid breathing in toxic VOCs from mould spores in her and her husband’s living space. But she’ll also wear it into shops, too. I think she (and all of us who tough it out) deserves a medal for bravery and tenacity. Today, TashaLee gets two: one for bravery and another for sharing information to help make our lives better.

More from TashaLee:

Answers to questions about life in a mask: how I sound, how to seal it, how it affects [relationships]