Living with multiple chronic illnesses can be a struggle, and I feel so fortunate that in this day and age, I am able to get medical advice from Internet acquaintances. I wonder sometimes, how could I ever have been so foolish as to lay out thousands of dollars for medications and treatments of my verified medical disorders, when I could so easily have been cured by simply posting on social media that I was sick, and using the random advice of strangers to cure myself?
I shake my head and laugh at my own ignorance. What was I thinking?
To think of the times I’ve sat here on my couch in the throes of an asthma attack, sucking on an inhaler and feeling like I’m surely about to die; I’ve felt so panicked at my lack of ability to move oxygen through my dysfunctional lungs I’ve wasted good money to visit my physician and – though I’m ashamed to admit it – I’ve accepted prescriptions for medications such as steroids. Once, in the midst of an agonizing attack, I shared my experience on Twitter, where I received the most excellent advice. “Try breathing slow.” It seemed radical and possibly even harmful, but I was desperate, and I tried it. You know what? It worked! All this time, all I had to do was breathe slow, and BAM, I was cured! How do people even die from asthma? Why don’t they just breathe? Seriously people, we have to try to help ourselves a little bit.
I remember not too long ago when my autoimmune disease was flaring, and I was in so much pain I could barely move. The actual air hurt me. Fatigue weighed me down so that staying awake for any length of time felt like an utterly unreasonable option. The hives! The swelling! Let me tell you, it was a miserable experience. Sure, I’d seen a rheumatologist about it, but really, how much about autoimmune disease do they know? Are we sure rheumatologists are even real doctors? Anyway, I’m lucky to have that one Facebook friend who knows all about Big Pharma, and how all doctors – even the rheumatologists! – are really just puppets for Monsanto. Now that I have this insider knowledge about how the medical community works, I’m glad I have this friend to explain what I really need to cure me. Her advice? “Just don’t think about it.” That’s right! It seems simple, and that’s the beauty of it. I don’t know why I never thought of this before. Here I was, thinking about the disease, and that’s what made me sick! So I just stopped thinking about it, and it disappeared! Like magic, really.
Migraines can be tricky, and I’ve been held hostage by these miserable life suckers for nearly thirty years now. Like everyone else I know, I usually drink mud with my meals, but I never considered there could be a connection between my mud intake and the soul-crushing headaches that have plagued me for so long. Until someone left me a comment about drinking water. Actually, the comment itself was far more convoluted and eloquent than that. What the person actually typed was, “Have you tried drinking lots of water every day?” I mean, it hit me like a ton of bricks, and I had to take some time to consider my poor life choices. It’s not as though I’ve never had a drink of water before, it’s just that once I get the necessary amount of mud fluids in me, I’m not all that thirsty. And to be perfectly honest, such a wild idea seemed a bit off the rails. I mean, who does something like that? What kind of person just drinks water every day? But I’m here to tell you, when you’ve been in bed for days on end, and your head feels like someone is repeatedly shoving an axe into it, and you are vomiting from the incessant pain, you’re willing to try just about anything. So… I tried it. I drank water. Lots of it, every day. And I am cured! I hardly ever even drink mud anymore. Not going to lie, my family thinks I’m super weird and it makes holiday dinners awkward because everyone feels like they have to accommodate my new water needs, but I’m holding firm. It’s my health, after all. I’ve got to take charge.
Another thing I’ve added to my diet is kale seed shakes. A new friend of mine on Facebook started sending me multiple daily private messages about how great they work, and though at first I was hesitant, I decided to give them a go. Back before I decided to cure myself, I figured that physicians and pharmacists knew were the ones to ask about my medical problems. Stupidly, I thought that spending so much time at medical school taught them how to help me. But now that I’m aware of who’s really lining their pockets, I’ve decided to seek medical counsel from people I barely know on social media who sell pseudo-health products via messenger. I mix the kale seed with my daily mud – and of course, chase it with plenty of water! – and I can’t tell you how much difference it has made in my life. Kale seed cures everything that can possibly go wrong with a human body, but nobody except the people who sell it knows how much it can really do. The only reason kale seed shakes aren’t more mainstream is because the government doesn’t want us to know they can cure everything from asthma to cancer. It’s a conspiracy, and I for one, am no longer a sheep willing to believe what I’m told.
In sum, I’m truly thankful for those who have taken the time to send me message after message – and auto DM’s of medical advice on Twitter are super cool! – about all the ways I can cure myself. Laying the blame for my multiple chronic illnesses right on my lap makes me feel in control. Knowing I’ve caused my health problems through my own stupidity is helpful and offers the opportunity for others to regard my pain with scorn and disbelief. If only someone had stepped up before now to tell me to just breathe, to stop thinking about my illness, and to try drinking water, how different the last couple decades of my life might have been. Thank you, random Internet commenters, for curing my chronic illnesses. If only I could have back the money I’ve spent on actual medical treatments, I could buy a lifetime’s worth of kale seed shakes.
