Danny Fowler:  

parts of unequal value, and it would all add up at last. Naaw, un-huh, didn't quite happen exactly like that. As a matter of fact, I was starting to feel myself slowing down, sleeping a little more, then having days, then weeks, where I would feel absolutely drained. Those of you who know me also know that I am not the stress type, never had any panic attacks, no sky is falling moments, no agoraphobia, nothing. It's really not in my architecture. I have always been more or less been able to let it flow, with exception to times I might purposely abandon self control, letting my temper get the best of me and act like the fool I can be at times. So I knew something was different, and I made appointments with my primary care giver (doctor in the vernacular of the once was days long ago), who referred me to a specialist after my first set of blood panels came back. The specialist wanted his own set of coagulation tubes filled with my blood, and also wanted me to participate in a colonoscopy. Passing the c-oscopy with no strange abnormalities or growths that might give cause for alarm, Dr. Gastro (short but sweet renaming of my specialist) explained that the fatigue that I had been feeling with increasing frequency was in fact Hepatitis C, and that my viral load was over 5 million, and that it was apparently actively at war with my immune system as they both fought for the territory which would become the spoils of said war, my liver. Hmmm, sounded like a drag. The theory being that the hep C has multiplicity to out fight and over-populate the areas that my immune system was trying to secure, with no real possibility that could ever happen without treatment. I had a liver biop next, again revealing no visible cirrosis, minimal tissue scarring, and no permanent damage to organ or tissue. Dr Gastro then told me the treatment options, all involving a pegylated interferon alpha-2, as well as a 6 pill per day menu of ribavirin, for at least a year, carefully monitoring my reaction to the interferon / ribavirin infusion to my body for early signs of side effect or peripheral challenges that would negate my inclusion in the program, being a genome1 in this optimum genome 2 world I was being introduced to. The doc couldn't say how long I had been carrying the hep C virus, nor could he guess how I had contracted it, but as far as I know, I had possibly been carrying a dormant hep C virus ever since I was in the Army, the 1972-73 era. The Doc also told me about a new drug that was being tested by the FDA that had shown significant increases in the percentage of success when used in addition to the interferon and ribavirin treatment that had become standard to the medical treatment for hepatitis C on genome 1 types specifically, increasing the success rate from around 58% to an impressive 92% in results from the most current studies on genome type 2's, though the % fell just a little on genome 1's from 92% to around 85%, which was still margins better than the 58% without this new drug. So we waited. I changed doctors when my health care insurance ran out, and was miraculously sent application forms for the Oregon Health Plan, having been picked in a lottery that I didn't even know I was signed up for (flirting with the girls up front has always gotten me certain percs, and a measurable quantity of trouble with a capital T, but this time it paid off because one of the girls, Tina, told me she had put my name in for consideration, as did another lady at the hospital who worked in the financial aid section of the hospital as well as doing the paperwork for any living will or life sustaining directives that had to be signed before entering surgery. Long story short, I got the OHP, and after almost a year and a half, I am taking the bottles of Ribavirin, Incivek (teleprevir, the new drug which is also 6 pills a day) and my premeasured needles of interferon to my new doctor in exactly 75 minutes to begin this whole new excursion into the unknown world of remedy, cure, and survivorship, while passing through a morbid periphery of acute sickness, side-effects, and depression, before I can claim a victory or even think about the next corner I will come to, and what might be around it. I never have fear in surgeries, in violent accidents that have left me with life threatening injuries to my lungs, vertibrae, or blood, having had infected blood in the past, non related to the present. Anyway, that's the update. Sometimes when we begin to see light at the end of the tunnel, we get so excited, it never crosses our minds that it could be another train. All Aboard!! You all have a great holiday season, and I will be back with future updates, as my energy levels begin to rise, lifting me up to a more familiar lifeforce, the one that has always allowed me to live my own version of this crazy life!! See Ya! Danny