Tuesday, May 20, 2008

天賦異秉 (gifted) 2

If you ask me, at this point in time, whether I would believe the doctors I see at home would be able to find an alternative diagnosis other than a few disc herniations and impingements….

The answer is… Actually… Nope…

For, I have now finally come to understand what I was once told… “You go from one doctor to the other while everyone says that they have done their best.”

Yet, since it hurts nothing more than my wallet, I shall still try to see whether there are other organic conditions that might have contributed to my retarded speed of recovery in turns of pains, spasms and mobility.

There are two major reasons for my search for The Diagnosis… hopefully, it would yield an alternative treatment, which could do miracle or explain the unexplainable speed of my recovery (at least as per comments of many professionals I have encountered), and, second, to show, at least to myself, that something else other than my beautiful mental head is at fault—

Although alternative diagnoses might not do anything constructive to the process of recovery, at least and hopefully, they might be better than “unexplainable.” Like what they say—he who has the why could bear any how… although I have been trying with all my might to carry out the hows without a why consented by all experts.

Of course, it is highly likely that my wanting a diagnosis better explaining to me my physical condition is synonymous to Alexander the Great’s pursuit for the end of the world--- both senseless search towards meaningless ends in vain.

In any case, so, today is the EMG day… since my legs are not dropping and I still have control over my peeping and pooping, I had not expected the results to be much different than what came out last year… within normal range it is.

After the first part of the test, where I got electric shocked, I learned that the signal in my peripheral nervous system is fine.

Then, I went on for the second part of the test, where the doctor stick a needle into my leg and turned the needle inside around to collect more info.

I did not recall the guy before me making a sound.

However, the pain was so unbearable to me that I found it difficult to do the tasks he asked me to perform such as pressing my foot up and down against his hand.

So I mourned, cursed and, possibly, howled with this gigantic question mark over my forehead... why do the same amount of physical stimuli cause pains so severe in my but not in the others?

Why am I so very well endowed with something I could really do without?

Then, a senior doctor came in and called off the test…

He said, “The test so far is within normal range.”

I replied, “I know… that’s what I found last time I had an EMG but why am I still the same way I am.”

He replied, “Having EMG in normal range doesn’t mean that you are not sick… It means you have not collapsed yet. Maybe in 10 years your body would really collapse and that would be the time for a surgery.”

Then, this other senior doctor walked in and someone mentioned that he also had herniation.

I asked him, “When did the spasm stop?”

Dr. Hernia responded, “Never. I finally needed to have a surgery done. You are stuck with it your entire life.”

“But I am only 30 something!” I said…. Thinking… I am supposed to be stuck with them my entire life… Lord oh no!

Then, I got up from the examination table, picked up my stuffs, and slowly moved out the lab with my cane at hand….

In addition to the ordinary amount of intensified pain in my neck and back these past few days, plausibly having something to do with my trying to go off Naproxen, the physical exam or the MRI scan yesterday, the body seemed to still have memory about pains caused by the needling acts and added extra spasms and pains to my left leg… (ok… call it imagination or hallucination but that’s, anyway, how I felt and hallucinations are what I am entitled to as well… lol)

I, then, thought to myself… Why am I so very 天賦異秉 or gifted in this thing called pain perception, be the stimuli real or not, be the intensity appropriate or not, or, be it dorsal horn reorganized or not.

Could the pains be the major contributing factor that slows down the recovery speed—be the slow recovery rate the result of the pains’ sole contribution or the interactions between pains and other factors?

How could I make myself, if not the others, really understand that it is not my fault to be so sensitive to pain and having to bear its consequences such as spasms--- rather, it is that of my brain… 8-O lol (speaking of metacognition)

Why can’t I trade my pains with gains (other than weight and age)? lol

And, like what one once said, “It hurts me. Why so much pain?”

Such concludes this chapter about the process of redeeming my 天賦異秉 or my special talent in… pain. lol sign

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