Friday, April 10, 2009

H. Pylori

I am not ready to try this yet because to be honest I am too scared too. I am too scared to see what it would cause to happen. I am very fearful of making things worse. However I can't help but wonder what would happen if I embrace the pain?

What if I stopped caring what happens to me? What if I embrace the rapid heart rate and enjoy the rocking of my body it causes? If I stop fighting the vomiting and just throw up as often as my body wants and let myself panic without controling it. Really let myself get as sick as my body wants to get and put up no fight.

Of course I doubt I could do it. I would most likely end back up in the ER which I am trying to avoid right now, which is why I don't want to faint. If I faint not only will it scare the crap out of me, but they said I would have to return to the ER.

I have been thinking about the H. Pylori infection I was told I have. I am in no shape what so ever to be downing megadoses on antibiotics right now. Truth is I already know I can not tolerate the pills to get rid of it. Normal doses of antibiotics are hell on my system. I also know I am in no shape for a scope to be done right now. They would only put benzos back in me to knock me out and reset everything I have gone though. I am not interested in the risks involved with a scope either.

I will see the gastro doctor and do another type of test to prove I have an active infection. If I do then I do. I choose not to treat it. In reality it is not going to kill me this year. Even if I have an ulcer I can get rid of it by taking drugs like pepcid and quitting smoking.

H. Pylori was found to cause ulcers in the 80's and has been linked to stomach cancer, colon cancer, and even heart attacks now. But here is the thing. 50%-70% of the world population is infected with H. Pylori. In the United States 20% of people are infected under age 40 and 50% of people are infected over age 50. It has been in humans for 1000's of years. Something doesn't sound right. Even after you treat you can become reinfected. Some say it is rare to be reinfected and others say it is common. They are still studying this bacteria. Some scientists find it has positive aspects like preventing diabetes and oddly people who have H. Pylori are at risk for stomach cancer, but people who don't have it are more likely to actually die from the stomach cancer. Also people who don't have H. Pylori are more likely to get certain throat cancers and H. Pylori is thought to prevent children from getting asthma so what the fuck? Do they even know what the fuck they are talking about anymore?

My mind changes on this issue ever few hours and will continue too, but as of right now my answer is hell no I am not treating this shit till you have a better treatment that is not going to make me sick as hell and could do lasting damage to me. Hell no I am not treating something that ups my risk of other diseases when all your studies say "It is not yet known if treating H. Pylori lowers the stomach cancer risk once it is treated after infection has taken place." What the hell people. If this was 1980 and I had an ulcer they would say it was caused by stress and tell me to take anti-acid drugs till it got better.

They use to do Upper GI tests to see ulcers and now scopes are all the rage and biopsies. I am not stupid if things get worse I will do the test and treat. But for right now they can do an upper GI. No freaking scope, no megadoses of pills chasing a bacteria they are not 100% sure is doing very much at all except causing ulcers in some people who have the infection.

Anyway in an hour I will be crying wondering how I can get through the scope and take all those pills. My mind is all over the place.

1 comment:

funny bunny said...

hi,
i've been following you on youtube. Its really wonderful of you to share information on Agoraphobia... seriously i didn't know anything about it before i heard you talk. I didn't understand anything about it.
I really hope you get better... thanks for sharing this with the rest of us.