The gimp seemed an appropriate category title if not category.
Alright, I spend about 99% of my comments on /. trying to be funny. I'll be a little serious here. I have a disease.
It's called sarcoidosis
I was diagnosed in March. I had to have a mediastinoscopy to biopsy the hilar lymph nodes in my chest in order to make the diagnosis. It's actually a same-day surgery but it's still dangerous and I had to go under general anesthesia so I pushed for March 31st rather than April friggin' fools day. Obviously, it all worked out.
The Surgery
A 3 inch incision was made on the crook of my throat just below my adam's apple and just below the neck-line of a t-shirt. Right about the spot you'd expect a tracheotomy to be. Chicks dig scars so it all worked out - I can play the sympathy card on my wife by showing her my scar.
The doctor inserted some gizmos into the incision and followed my windpipe all the way to the center of my chest behind my zyphoid to cut out some of my hilar lymph nodes. The dangerous part was that he had to "sneak" right past my aorta, pulmonary artery and my heart to get there. Hooray me. (Hooray me is funny if you've seen the Red Stripe been commercials).
I woke up some time later with a pain in the neck. It actually didn't hurt nearly as much as I anticipated. The surgery was on a Wednesday - I went back to work for a half day on Friday.
The Disease
Sarcoidosis is a weird, fibrotic, auto-immune disease. Nobody knows what causes it and there's no cure. This page explains it best.
Anyay, I'm not really upset that I have the disease - I'm really upset with 1) the symptoms and 2) the treatment.
1. I get really frustrated because it affects my lungs and really hinders my breathing. Now, don't get me wrong, it's not like I'm huffing and puffing sitting here in a chair but I can't play sports like I used to, I can't do a lot of the physical things to the same degree that I used to. That pisses me off.
*Background*
I'm 6-4 235. I played football since I could walk. I turned down dozens of college div 1A scholarship offers to join the US Army and (eventually) become a sniper and combat weapons specialist. In other words, I'm a very physical kind of guy. I gave up football years ago but I used to play Wallyball at a local gym on my lunch breaks. I also have some land with woods and a small stream in my back-yard and it takes some work to keep it up. It frustrates me to no end to be limited by my stupid lungs. Bah, who needs 'em.
2. The treatment is prednisone. Prednisone is a corticosteroid. It's only purpose is to halt and potentially shrink the inflamation in my lungs and lymph nodes. That's all well and good and it does work - I can breathe much better when I take it. Unfortunately, it's immunosuppressive and it has about every nasty effing side-effect you can dream of.
- upset stomach
- stomach irritation
- vomiting
- headache
- dizziness
- insomnia
- restlessness
- depression
- euphoria
- anorexia
- weight gain
- high blood sugar levels
- increased susceptibility to infection
- anxiety
- acne
- increased hair growth
- easy bruising
- irregular or absent menstrual periods
- glaucoma
- cataracts
- high blood pressure
- et-friggin-cetera
I'm experiencing some side-effcts except the irregular menstrual periods. I'm still regular so I got that goin' for me. (think Carl from caddyshack).
So, the punch-line here is that I don't mind the disease so much as the treatment.
Prednisone is also one of those drugs that takes a while to build up in your system and you can't just stop taking it abruptly. Whenever I miss a dose of prednisone I get mean as hell. I mean I get pissed-off, don't fuck with me mean. It's a horrible thing. It's like driving a truck with no brakes - you can steer it but you can't stop it. I KNOW that I'm pissed off and I KNOW that it's because I missed my dope but I can't stop being angry and irritated. I'm like the Mastiff or the Great Dane - it's ok if the Chihuaha or the dachshund get's angry - it might nip at your heels but don't fucking stick around when the big dog gets mad 'cause you aren't going to win. I hate it when I feel that way. It's just horrible for everyone - I get short and yell at people, my wife, my buddies at work. They all know why I'm pissed off too but that doesn't make it right or any better. The worst part is, when I finally get my fix, I feel 10 times worse for being that way. It's a nasty drug and I don't envy anyone that has to take it. As long as I don't miss a dose - and it's not really very often - I'm pretty good.
I missed today's dose which brought out Mr. Hyde but I hurried home and took it this evening and I'm feeling much better. I warned my wife so we could avoid that whole mess and me feeling like a big jerk when Dr. Jekyll came back.
It's ok to make jokes about the disease to me - I'm cool with it and I joke all the time with my buddies about it. I don't take life too serious - no one gets out alive. I know sometimes people get weird about "What do you say?" and the whole stigma attached to diseases. How 'bout "Nice scar, dude.", for starters.