Once Upon a Time

In a place not so different for anyone, I was having many health issues that had no good answers. After five years of tests and two or three hospital stays, I was being prepped for surgery; that was nothing too scary or strange, it was a hernia repair that was long overdue and came to the attention of a surgeon who I had met on an earlier hospital stay.

Don’t get me wrong, the hernia was no joy and would cause me pain at times, and of course, there is a fear it will go wrong and become more serious, which is true with any surgical intervention. It was the second repair in the same area, and because of my having asthma, the anesthesiologist wanted to be very thorough and ordered some tests that had not been done thus far.

This was when it began to get a little concerning for me. First, there was the test to see if I had hemochromatosis: a condition that is often passed genetically, and it was negative and was followed by hepatitis A, B, and C testing.

My hep C diagnosis

That revealed that I had antibodies for hep c, and subsequent testing revealed that yes, it was hep C I had. The dragon had come to attack me, and I knew virtually nothing about what weapons I needed and how good my chances were in the upcoming battle.

My body had marshaled all its defenses and lost the first battle when my immune system was not up to the challenge. The dragon had spawned minions throughout my body, attacking me at every turn.

I wondered what lay ahead, and to be honest, I believed that I would never win the war, even if I fought bravely with all my might and my weapons assembled. The dragon was a formidable foe that many had faced before me, and joining forces with the community of fellow fighters gave us all strength and resolve.

We held each other up, even in the face of such adversity, and shared strategies for the battles ahead. The help of others was not magic, but the best kind of love.

As it turned out, the most potent weapon of the day was toxic and only worked for half of us, but some took that plunge forward, and we persevered. Some of us won the war, while others were better off waiting for better ways to defeat the evil dragon.

Winning the battle

The elixir was unforgiving for some and caused more harm, and waiting was the best way forward. Then one day, a remarkable thing happened in our world.

A new weapon arrived that all could use and almost all were then free of the evil dragon!

We celebrate when we hear of another warrior winning their own war and ridding the dragon of the evil place he was spawned.

No, we do not all live happily ever after, but we fight for what we all want, which is a better life for ourselves and those affected.