Rilov and other guys sharing those thoughts, as mentioned earlier, I do not ask for sympaphy or advice, and as I also mentioned, I am not trying to convince you in anything. This is just a set of storied I decided to write. A free contribution to this forum , which you may or may not appreciate. If not happy, please read some other more positive posts. I will try to post a few pictures too. You may like them.
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HEALTH PROBLEMS 2008-2010
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My wife has colitus. It is not the end of the World by itself, but it comes with many complications.
She has trouble at work, going to the bathroom more often than a regular employee, she is discouraged to ask for time off to see her doctor and when she was supposed to see a specialist, she was put on a long wait list. The work environment in most companies is one of intimidation and constant fear. By her 12th month on the job, she was told she went missing too many times. They had counted every time she was late 5 minutes or asked for a doctors appointment, so when after 14 montsh she was called by the specialist, she did not go for fear of losing her job.
Her condition got worse and worse and her hands got covered by exema-like spots that itched and cracked, and bleeded and hurt. As we speak her whole body is covered by them. We went to a number of physicians with hopes, but in the end she realized she was paying hundreds of dollars for useless conversations during which she demonstrated she knew more about her condition than the physician himself/herself.
I am rather active in my spare time, which has been a lot in the past years; lots of hiking and fishing. One day at the lake while walking over some bumpy terrain my left heel started to hurt. I thought it was something minor and after taking off my shoes went wading into the lake.
The heel continued to hurt and swell. Now I could even feel there was something hard inside the tissue on the bottom of my foot. Strange!
They took an x-ray and I went to my family doctor to see what se had to say. She had the picture on her screen and started explaining to me that she could see calcifications on the bone. I said, the object does not appear to be connected to the bone. At this she turns the screen to me pointing at a thin lighter looking layer running along the bone; did she ever listen to my explanation?
I could clearly see the object I was looking for in the picure - an oval "thing" about 2cm in diamater lodged in the middle of the tissue. I raised my finger and put it on the object. Here!
According to her this was a non life threatening problem and although at the time I could hardly walk, she suggested I was going to wait at least 6 months to see a specialist. Then I waited and waited, and called again. The new estimate was 1 year. To make sure the object was not growing I did new X-rays.
After the year had passed I called my doctor to ask why noone had contacted me yet. They now said, with what I had the NORMAL wait time would be between 1.5 and 2 years. This now drove me nuts! I told them I should have known about that a year ago, and that I would want to see a specialist in another town in my province if possible.
Three months later someone calls me from a town 400km away. I was working on a contract then and could not go. Finally, after 1.5 years I am called and invited to the office of Dr.X. What I will write below is not a joke but the actual words I heard in the office.
The wait continued in the doctors waiting room for anoher 30 minuted after which I was admited into the office. There was the doctor and his new British assistant, probably a student, waiting for me. The doctor explained it was going to be his assistant to evaluate my situation after which we were all going to talk about it.
"Ok, so your right foot is hurt..." - starts the assistant
"No, my left one" says I
"Oh, it says right foot here!!!" - exclaims he pointing at the papers. "Can you walk?"
"Yeah, I just walked in."
"Take off your shoes, please, and take a few strides, how does it feel?"
I started explaining how and when I observed the bump on my foot, and what it felt like, and what I thought it was....I was providing more information than what I was getting back.
At the end the assistant called the doctor into the office. They exchanged purplexed looks.
"Lets take a look at the x-rays" - I suggested
They slowly brought the picture up on the screen and the doctor clicked on it. It did not enlarge.
"It is not working, must be the system" - says the doctor
"No, probably the computer" - offers the asistant
"My family doctor insists this is a calcification. D you know how something like this can be formed inside the tissue?" - asks me
"Well how do you tell the difference between bone and calcification?" - the doctor asks the assistant.
A second later he answered his own question:
"Both are calcium, right."
I left the office thankful I was not scheduled for surgery that day. Maybe they wer egoing to cut off my head instead of my foot, which wasn't going to be particularly bad if they knew how to fit me with a new and better one.
