Is it Luck?

There is an ongoing argument of sorts in my mind about what are the forces at play when things go well or badly, and this can also be applied to my health and specifically my hep C experience.

Was it bad luck or other forces that I was exposed to hep C, or was it the result of something quite different altogether? Was I just lucky to only have moderate damage to my liver, or was that because of my efforts to reduce intake of substances that harmed my liver in the absence of a hep C diagnosis?

I have no clue, and kind of seems like a chicken-egg thing. Was the damage moderate because of some genetic difference in my molecular makeup?

You cannot predict the future

The thing is that we cannot predict with any degree of certainty, in my observations, who will suffer worse effects over time with the hep c virus or any other viral infection.

Learning about the longer-term effects of covid has shone some light on an area that posits the question of the who and why. Those of us who have a genetic predisposition to develop extrahepatic manifestations of viral hep C have been dealt cards that are not in our favor, and no single action is going to perfectly prepare us or prevent a more rapid progression of the disease.

That does not mean that there are not things we can do or steps we can take to mitigate harm. We have been told for a very long time that an ounce of prevention was worth a pound of cure, and I accept this as a sound approach for many things, but only when there is a deliberate effort to discover the best way to prevent and subsequently apply it as more than words and are an action that has indicated it is safe and effective.

Counting on luck is dangerous and may cause greater harm. Gambling on something as important as our health or the health of others is simply unacceptable. It is no better than guesswork.

Luck has nothing to do with science

Applying practical and evidence-based approaches have the best chance of success, and using well-developed critical thinking skills, will win the day over-relying on being lucky. How does one even measure success with luck?

Averages may be one way to look at it. I have no idea at all. There will always be random results from any action and rules that can apply, but this is not so much guesswork or luck.

Statistical data does not depend on luck either, despite the outliers presenting results that can mystify even the most brilliant analysis.

Remember Sherlock Holmes and his approach to untangling mysterious activities? The process of deductive reasoning is useful when we want to eliminate what something isn’t. Step by step, we can get closer to the cause or closer to the truth in what is the best path forward.

With luck? Your choice, of course.