Saw someone today
10-05-2011, 02:55 AM
#31
Addict
Among friends it's Douglas 
OK, one more medical post.
At the age of 19 I had my nose cauterized at the BYU medical center. All through high school my nose would bleed almost nightly. It turns out I was my own phlebotomist. For the next 2 years my condition accelerated and went unchecked and untreated.
At 21 I returned to California and showed all the signs of Hemochromatosis but still did not have a diagnosis. My HMO finally listened to me and ran a battery of tests. The liver biopsy confirmed it. To this day Kaiser Permanente has not seen a case as severe as mine. Now there is an RN with an entire clinic dedicated to this. My brother and sister also have it, but not quite as bad.
I do have cirrhosis of the liver and have ultrasounds every six months.
At 22 I got my first pacer to compensate for a fib and v tach. Now at 44 I'm on my 4th pacemaker and have complete heart block.
At 23 we discovered I hadn't gone through puberty. For 5 months I got HCG shots. I grew 2 inches taller and put on 50 pounds of muscle almost instantly. We now have 6 kids of our own and one that we are legal guardians of.
At first it was a pint on monday and a pint on friday. That lasted almost a year before I had had enough and ran away and went back to school. We lost count somewhere around 150 pints of blood. I was given an A/V fistula that lasted almost 20 years and freaked out everyone that saw it.
Now my ferritin is around 20, my skin color is normal, and the hardest part of the disease is the arthritis and the pseudogout. The current pacemaker is actually working wonders for my stamina and ability to keep going under stress.
I've thrown away a pint of blood every 4 to 6 weeks for the last 20 years.
When I tell you it took 15mg of Mobic and 150mg of Ultram to change out my kids radiator, valve cover gasket, and plug wires tonight, you best believe I'm not kidding.
Anyway, tomorrow starts in 5-1/2 hours.
OK, one more medical post.
At the age of 19 I had my nose cauterized at the BYU medical center. All through high school my nose would bleed almost nightly. It turns out I was my own phlebotomist. For the next 2 years my condition accelerated and went unchecked and untreated.
At 21 I returned to California and showed all the signs of Hemochromatosis but still did not have a diagnosis. My HMO finally listened to me and ran a battery of tests. The liver biopsy confirmed it. To this day Kaiser Permanente has not seen a case as severe as mine. Now there is an RN with an entire clinic dedicated to this. My brother and sister also have it, but not quite as bad.
I do have cirrhosis of the liver and have ultrasounds every six months.
At 22 I got my first pacer to compensate for a fib and v tach. Now at 44 I'm on my 4th pacemaker and have complete heart block.
At 23 we discovered I hadn't gone through puberty. For 5 months I got HCG shots. I grew 2 inches taller and put on 50 pounds of muscle almost instantly. We now have 6 kids of our own and one that we are legal guardians of.
At first it was a pint on monday and a pint on friday. That lasted almost a year before I had had enough and ran away and went back to school. We lost count somewhere around 150 pints of blood. I was given an A/V fistula that lasted almost 20 years and freaked out everyone that saw it.
Now my ferritin is around 20, my skin color is normal, and the hardest part of the disease is the arthritis and the pseudogout. The current pacemaker is actually working wonders for my stamina and ability to keep going under stress.
I've thrown away a pint of blood every 4 to 6 weeks for the last 20 years.
When I tell you it took 15mg of Mobic and 150mg of Ultram to change out my kids radiator, valve cover gasket, and plug wires tonight, you best believe I'm not kidding.
Anyway, tomorrow starts in 5-1/2 hours.
