I'm a Lucky Man

So, let's summarize my life.

When I was 25, I took antibiotics, which gave me diarrhea and eventually infection of my abdominal lining. This was candidiasis. The infection destroyed the nerves in the abdominal lining and left behind the candidiasis. I then developed SIADH from just drinking water for days due to the burning in the abdomen.

From there, I experienced a heart block that caused a slight suction to occur in the inferior vena cava. This was due to the heart beating harder and causing suction during the expansion of the right atrium. This then changed the relative pressures at the kidneys, damaging them and causing potassium retention and extreme loss of sodium. This caused huge fluctuations in my blood pressure as the only way I could think was to drink even more water. I could not sleep and checked myself into a mental institution.

While in this mental institution, I experienced huge polyuria and could not keep hydrated. they had 3 medical books behind the counter. I asked to look at them. In one, I found a condition called Terminal Onset Diabetes Insipidus with Candidiasis (Majeure). It was actually one of the larger articles in the medical diagnostic manual. It was a discussion of individuals in the early 20th century that had a similar set of circumstances due to Tuberculosis infecting their adrenals. This condition was fatal and would lead to a stroke from volume loss. However, an experimental treatment was administered that would add 20-25 years to the person's life but also result in years of symptoms without clinical findings.

This solution was to have the patient hold their urination until their body was sufficiently acidified and then administer a shot of adrenaline. This treatment would cause a "pseudo-stroke" from increased blood pressure to the brain and put the pituitary into overdrive. The pituitary would then take over all salt balance handling messaging from the hypothalamus. While this would allow the patient to live longer, it resulted in a greatly reduced blood volume. Over the years, the patient's system could decompensate and recompensate in various ways, each resulting in changes in fluid volumes and concentrations of the interstitial space. Eventually, almost total volume loss would occur. Insidiously, this is hidden by cells of the body becoming apoptotic. This apoptosis is caused by the combination of candidiasis and potassium concentrations. The candidiasis inhabits the cells of the body and results in the reversal of the Sodium-Potassium pump. This causes the shrinkage of the cells, and in the case of skin cells causes them to appear pink. Thus the skin never looks like it is deprived of oxygen or diseased.

Many phases and transitions exist for this condition.

On that day, in a mental institution, I duplicated that experiment with two (2) two-liter bottles of diet coke. My thinking was that I could hold my urination as indicated for the experiment and then add to the acidification with the diet coke. The caffeine would also boost adrenaline. Finally, I held my breath and pushed air from my lungs, increasing the blood pressure to my head. It worked. I endured the worst headache imaginable. I could not wiggle a finger without causing shooting pain in my head. Every sound was like a gunshot, but I could not move. This lasted less than an hour, and then, I no longer had polyuria, I was warm instead of freezing cold, and my bowels moved for the first time in days. All immediately after the headache.

Today, I have reached 26 years from that time. I am in the final days of my life. I accept that. I have lived to twice the age I was at the time. I saved my life with ingenuity and research in the most unlikely way possible.

Of course, I thought that I would be able to find that article after my release, but I have never been able to find it or any record of the experiments.

But, I have had a career, two marriages, a son, trips, experiences, and watched the computer age turn into the digital age, and now the age of AI. I have an electric damn car! It is so cool. Am I sad? Yes. Am I angry? Of course. Am I grateful? You bet I am. I cannot know for certain what would have happened to me in that hospital on that day, had I not done what I did, but I am reasonably sure I would have died. Perhaps not. I didn't care to take the chance.

I find it all fascinating. My body is in a state that no person's body has been in for 100 years. My body literally does not function like any other human's body. From how energy is created and consumed to what happens to foods that I eat. None of this is the same as other people and that all remains hidden. I am the world's leading expert in my condition, and I really have some huge gaps in my knowledge. I've endured pain so many times over the years. On at least several dozen nights, I have not thought I would live to see the next day. Most of that was this year, but there were other years..2012, 2014, and 2018, where I had transitions that were scary as hell.

I leave behind the best wife on the planet, the best son on the planet, and the best mother on the planet. I am so sorry for their loss, for putting them and my ex-wife through parts of this disease. Over the last seven and a half months, I have done everything I can to get a medical professional to see my condition. I have written it up in detail and presented it to them. No one believes me. It doesn't matter. I have done what I can, not to be saved, but to get some clarity for my family.

Sadly, without clarity, I have had to hide the condition from my son. I have been honest with my wife, my mother, and my coworkers. I don't know whom among those believe me, but I believe honesty is best. On the whole, I am glad my son has not had to be concerned with a terminal sentence for his father. I think that would be a huge weight on him during one of the most formative periods in his life. If I had to choose him knowing I was dying for 8 months or not knowing, I would choose him not knowing. Even though that breaks my heart. I want to really know my son, and he isn't old enough to know himself, yet. At 16, he is just becoming who he will be. Figuring it out like we all do.

Son, I love you more than anything. Know that I could not be more proud of you. Know that wherever your life may lead you, I would always be proud of you. Whatever, whomever you become, I believe it will be a good person, a wise person. A person I would love to have a drink with and hear about your day and the things that interest and upset you.

To my mother, I thank you for all you have done for me throughout my lifetime. I could not begin to summarize the trials of our life together, but we were far from a fairy tale and yet you made it all work. I am the man I am today because of you. Thank you.

To my wife, I have left you so many messages of love. I hope you know you are the only reason I have made it through this to this point. I literally could not have done it and would not have wanted to do it without you.

To everyone else, my family, friends, coworkers. It has been my honor to share this planet with you and I only ask that you take care of it and remember the funny, smart guy that would always say exactly what he was thinking.