Maybe It's "The Grippe"...

All right, let me preface this by saying that, when it comes to issues regarding health (mine in particular) I tend to catastrophize at bit. Okay, a fuckload. With that in mind, this may be my last post, as I will most surely be dead by morning.

Okay, remember my black and blue toe? Ol' Bruise-ter? Well, the bruise has faded, but some other funky shit has taken its place. For the last week or so, I've had this bizarre phenomenon where my hands and feet feel like the blood is just pooling in them, and they're all hot and stiff and prickly and shit. And they're all crampy and weak feeling and it gets worse when they're hot, like in the morning, when I have the comforter on them.

At first I thought it had something to do with my sitting on my ass in the freezing basement all fucking day, but now I'm not so sure. I have two theories:

Theory 1: The Theory Which is Mine
For the last year, I've been taking this anti-reflux pill called Zegerid. I was having this horrendous reflux that was burning a goddamn hole in my esophagus and this fucking wonder-drug fixed me right up. No more schpilkes in the schnitzengruben.

So I looked up the side-effects the other day to see if my hand/foot thing might be caused by this little wonder pill. Apparently, the active ingredient in Zegerid, (Omeprazole, for those keeping score), inhibits the little pumps in the stomach that make the acid and shit. It also blocks the absorption of a shitload of vitamins that your stomach acid normally helps you absorb. One of the vitamins it blocks is B12, which, when you don't get enough of it, leads to "numbness or tingling in the hands or feet," and a whole host of other delights, including... neurological damage (which would explain a fuck of a lot.) So yeah, no vitamin B12 for a year... sounds like a pretty solid theory, no?

Theory B: The Other Theory Which is Mine
Now this is where my catastrophization kicks in. There's usually one logical explanation and then I stumble upon the WORST-CASE SCENARIO! Fucking WebMD shitheads. In this case, my worst-case scenario is... Multiple Sclerosis. I'm telling ya, look at the fucking symptoms -- it's me, goddammit! Tingling? Got it. Numbness? Got it. Weakness in one or more limbs? Got it. Blurred vision? Okay, I don't have that. Sudden onset of paralysis? Okay, I don't have that. Lack of coordination? Well, Mr. Z has that in spades, so I'll count that as a "yes."

The thing is, no matter how much the logical explanation makes sense, it's the worst-case scenario that I always cling to. Oh, and did I mention that my grandma's sister had MS? Huh, huh, see?

I don't fucking know. I'm going to the doctor on Thursday to see what he says, which I'm sure will be, "Sorry, Crabbydad, but you've got a bad case of the MS. If I were you, I'd get my things in order. That'll be 200 dollars, please. NEXT!"

The Old Lady has been very patient with me. Believe it or not, I used to be a LOT worse with this kinda shit. During her 21 years with me, she's seen it all -- brain cancer, lockjaw, heart attacks, appendicitis, Boola-boola, Dengue fever, flesh-eating bacteria, SARS... you name it, I've had it. She listens to my complaints and then talks me the fuck down with a lethal combination of bullshit detection and logic. Tonight she said, "Look, we'll probably be together long enough where one day, one of us is going to get something. Maybe you do have MS. Maybe you'll have a brain aneurysm. Maybe I'll get breast cancer and have to have a double mastectomy. We'll just deal with whatever happens. It's very unlikely that we'll both just grow old and die peacefully in our sleep, or say 'Okay' and float off into space like Mr. Magorium."

I think she was trying to make me feel better, which is very sweet of her. Unfortunately, now all I can think about is brain aneurysms.