And You Thought You Had Problems...

Now I know that you can always find someone out there that has a harder trial, or sadder story then you. Everyone's trials are different. Mine just happens to be my extra-ordinary health! I would not be categorized by any means in the healthy column. I have had my fair share of medical problems. My running list is as follows, if anyone was keeping track...under the list of Surgeries: Gallbladder, Hysterectomy, Decompression of the Brain for Chiari Malformation, and Back Surgery for Tethered Cord Syndrome. Under the list of Diseases: Ulcerative Colitis, Thyroid Disease, Rheumatoid Arthritis, Fibromyalgia, and the newest one that they are looking into is Eosinophilic Esophagitis, but basically I have Autoimmune Disease and all of these are just the different parts of my body that my immune system has decided to attack. Sadly there is not just one doctor to take care of Autoimmune Disease so they send you to a bunch of different one's who all gladly except your money.

So my newest doctor that I have been going to is an Allergist. I have never been to one and found it very interesting. Apparently, I do belong in a bubble! So far I have just taken one of the tests, the pollens, and I am pretty much allergic to everything! If you have never been to an allergist this is what they do...They lay you on the table and you take off your shirt and they prick your back with lots of different tiny needles with what ever it is they test on you. Then you wait, and they tell you NOT to move or scratch! Now I have experienced my fair share of 10's on the pain scale but this is a whole different experience all together. It wasn't the pain that got me (which there was some burning, like little drops of acid dropped on your back) it was the being told not to scratch then putting stuff on you that makes you itch like no other! I was so allergic to some of the stuff that I had big welts on my back for a few days. I go back for my food allergy test next week!

So why you may ask am I putting myself through all of this...well I have had a sore throat for a little over a year now. Now you may think big deal...well think about it this way, how would you like strep throat for over a year!!! Yes that is at some points the pain level of my throat. It hurts and sometimes is hard to swallow. For a while I was having trouble breathing, but they stretched out my throat and now I'm doing better for now with that. This new autoimmune disease Eosinophilic Esophagitis is basically you have had an allergic reaction in the throat, usually something you eat, and your immune system goes to help out, well with this they think my immune system just hasn't stopped "helping" out, and continues to attack my esophagis. So they send you to an allergist to find out what is causing the reaction to start with and then you are suppose to stay away from that thing. If my life were only that simple! (And sadly yes I think that is one of the simpler sounding solutions to a disease!)

As Josh and I have found out in our lives with me and my health it rarely is THAT simple! When it was first suggested that maybe the answer to what is causing me to have a chronic sore throat, I started paying attention to what may be making my throat hurt more. Because some days were worse then others, some days I didn't have hardly a problem then others I wanted to ripe out my throat. A pattern started to form. Now.....I don't know how to say this without it sounding mean......but I was better when Josh was out of town and we didn't kiss. Josh and I have always joked that I was allergic to him, but when you have to tell your husband for real that you suspect that you really are allergic to him....tell me, how does he not take that personal? 

So Josh went with me to the Allergist and we asked him about what I was thinking. I really liked this guy he listened to us and he asked us a bunch of questions and he said that it was possible and that he has heard of it, but that he didn't know a lot about it and needed to study up on the subject. He did have Josh spit in a cup and took a needle and pricked my arm and put it on it to see if there was any kind of a reaction. Now he said that to really test it they would need to take Josh's spit and run it through a machine that takes it down to it's purest most concentrated form, but he just wanted to see. Josh thought it was funny that he got to spit on me. It wasn't a big reaction, but there was a reaction. At first nothing I didn't think it was doing anything, then as it was on there longer it started to burn like acid and after a while it did begin to itch. It got a little red and the doctor I think was even surprised that it had even that much of a reaction. After that he was more interested in this theory that it was Josh that was causing an allergic reaction in me. 

So that is where we are at right now we go back to the Allergist next week and test some more. I still have a sore throat and now my husband feels bad kissing me! You may ask "How Do You Deal With All Of This?" We deal with it the best way we know how...we shake our heads and joke about it!!