Rats--I can't whistle

I was reading Graeme Garden's account of his experience with Bell's palsy and a red flag went up. He discovered he had it when he suddenly found he couldn't whistle. So I puckered my lips and blew, and nothing came out! Oh, dear--whistling has always been my way of signaling my chickadees that I've got mealworms. And my neighborhood cardinal has been singing--I love whistling back to him. Again, this seemed cruel upon the first shocked discovery. But really, I can still see and hear them, and when my whistling comes back, I'll maybe have that same joyful thrill of accomplishment I had the first time I got a whistle to come out sounding like a cardinal some five decades ago.