My daughter has suffered some serious health issues lately. We are not talking allergies, colds or a sore throat here. Her symptoms include a rapid heart rate, edema, bruising, serious headaches, neck pain, and a straight line rash that erupts with an itching and burning and lasts about three to five days, painful the whole time. She's been to several doctors, including two gps and a cardiologist, whose idea of handling the situation was to throw pills at her--no attempt to find a diagnosis.
Further complicating the whole mess is the fact that without a diagnosis, her employer is being very uncooperative about her missing work for appointments and procedures. Talk about your vicious circle--you must not really be sick because there is no name for what you have. You can't take anymore time off. I understand you have two medical appointments, one a seriously long procedure, but can't you come to work in between those?
As her mother, I have been very concerned about the lack of diagnosis. Seems to me in our age of technology, that diagnosing my 33 year old daughter can't be that difficult. Really folks, we can put billions of bits of information in a thumb drive--literally no bigger than my thumb.
Being the librarian I am, I conducted some Internet research. I was alarmed at the illnesses in which her symptoms were manifested. Major organ involvement permeated the list and my alarm grew. Thankfully a few months back, Leigh had found a really good, thorough GP. She wasn't using him on a regular basis, because of his office hours--that's a whole other story, the lack of physicians offering office hours that are convenient to people who work 9-5. Instead, she was seeing a doctor who had late afternoon and evening appointments that she could go to after work. She finally broke down and took time from work to go see Dr. X. After running a series of tests, including taking enough blood to feed a vampire family for a week, yesterday she received some good news. She has two viruses, Epstein Barr Virus and cytomegalovirus.
What's that, you ask? Technically, the viruses are related. The latter produces the common cold sore, but sometimes can produce the same or similar sypmtoms as EBV, which is the mononucleosis virus. Yes, it is good news, because now we can at least put a label on how she feels. The list of symptoms is long, but includes every symptom she has, even though the doctor is not yet convinced that other things aren't going on.
She knows what she has now, but my work has just begun. I need to convince her that certain things need to happen if she's going to feel better. That's not an easy job because she is just as stubborn about things as I am.One of the first things I suggested is that she taking short walks in the evening to help her sleep. How could I have predicted that last night, she would take my advice and stroll outside our house between 9:30 and 10 PM? Not far mind you, but she had her cell phone in hand, trying to reach a few friends. She was right across the street from our home with her cell phone to her ear when a car drove up the street, slowed down, at which time someone inside pelted her with a frozen egg. It hit her in the rib cage with the force of a baseball. By the time she reached the front door, she was crying from the pain of being hit. I immediately called 911. After all, this was assault! About 30 minutes later, a police car pulled into our driveway. I was grateful they came although by that time there was probably little hope of them catching the culprits. They did mention they had several calls about the same car pelting eggs all over south Irving. I am appalled that none of these kids came to the realization that these eggs could hurt someone. That was indicated by the laughter as they sped away! Today, my daughter is bruised and extremely sore thanks to a careless prank. Should the police locate these young men, my suggestion would be they suffer the same fate as my daughter. This could work particularly well for her. There will be the therapeutic action of exacting justice, while showing off her wicked throw developed after years of playing softball. Using pin-point accuracy, I am sure she could place a few frozen eggs on well chosen targets!
