Two weeks before turning twenty-one, I was diagnosed with ME, FMS, and the gamut that come with them. The day before my birthday I was diagnosed with cervical dysplasia, which meant I was also diagnosed with HPV.
So I kinda don\’t like doctors and my birthdays.
This year, I\’m doing the Hopkins sleep study four days before my birthday. Then, on my birthday proper, I\’m seeing my psychiatrist to get me started back up on medication. But that\’s not all. Disability Support Services for Social Security want me to have a physical, so I\’m doing it in the hour following my shrink appointment. Three hours later, I\’m seeing a new rheumatologist–the first in two years–and here\’s the kicker: the rheumatologist I\’m seeing is in the same practice as the ones who diagnosed me four years ago–the same doctor who recommended that I get married, the same one who forced me to have cortisone shots against my will, the same one who first said I had FMS, then said I didn\’t, then changed his mind again. Well, this time the doctor in the practice specializes in FMS. Not only that, but he\’s also a specialist for osteonecrosis, which is fucking relevant as all hell, because it turns out cortisone shots can cause osteonecrosis, and my left hip has never recovered since the cortisone shots that the doctor forced me to get.
My birthday is going to be fun as shit this year. I\’m going to be physically poked and examined for hours by two different doctors, and then the next day I have to get on a plane and travel for 28 hours…but not before undergoing an extensive interview on the phone some time between 8am-12noon by the Department of Health and Human Services.
Maybe 24 will be my big year after all, culminating right in the hours before my mom gave birth in the late afternoon. All these doctors appointments… I\’m starting to actually be hopeful that my application for SSDI is going to be approved. I didn\’t actually think it would, but I\’ve been fucked up and on SSI for so long, I figured I needed to try. Now, I think it might actually happen.
