I was one of those people who always seemed to have something wrong with them. It seems once I got over one health issue, another one arose. I am not religious but I do remember many times cursing god and asking him/her to stop…all to no avail. What health issues you ask?
- In my youth (ages 8-14), I had WARTS. Some on my knee. Some on my hands. Not disfiguring mind you. Just annoying. Eventually, they went away.
- At age 10, I woke up one day not feeling well. We had a doctor who lived down the street come by and he suggested I get to the hospital right away. (To this day, I am wondering what he saw in me that made him suggest that. I felt like I just had a cold.) Anyway, I spent 7 long days in the hospital. Blood work out the kazoo. Diagnosis: unknown. I found out years later that they were testing me for RHEUMATOID ARTHRITIS. By the way, the highlight of the week was my dad visiting my every night after work and we’d watch Hogan’s Heroes together. It’s funny the things you remember.
- Through my childhood, I had a variety of NERVOUS TICS (throat clearing, eye rolling, etc.)
- In my teen years, I had the pleasure of dealing with ACNE. Worse than many; not as bad as some.
- At this point, I know what you’re thinking. “Wow…warts, tics AND acne. You must have been quite the catch.” Yeah…good times indeed.
- Fast forward to my late twenties and I developed LOWER BACK PAIN. Severe at times. It’s something I still deal with and actually am currently in physical therapy for it.
- In Spring 2007, I began peeing blood. Diagnosis: BLADDER CANCER. And you males out there don’t want to know how they diagnose it. Uh…huh. It was low-grade and after one reoccurrence, I’ve been cancer free (phew!!).
- In Spring 2008, after years of complaining of stomach aches and losing 15 pounds, I finally listened to Mrs. Dude and went to a GI. Diagnosis: CELIAC DISEASE.
- In Fall 2008, working one night, starting feeling “not right”. Pain in my neck and shoulder…hurt to inhale. Mrs. Dude said we should go to hospital. Do you think I learned my lesson? Of course not. Lying in bed, had a strange sensation. Almost like back pain, but in my entire torso. Jumped out of bed. Feeling went away. Mrs. Dude spent the entire night poking me in the back to make sure I was alive. The next day, my doc said I should go to emergency room just to get it checked out. After five hours of tests, diagnosis: MULTIPLE BLOOD CLOTS IN BOTH OF MY LUNGS (medical term: pulmonary embolism). That strange sensation I had was the clots passing thru my heart into my lungs. This is the point in time where most people die from this. Seriously…WTF!?
- I got hit bad with COVID in April 2020. Came in two waves. Not fun.
- Dupuytren’s Contracture. Tendons in my hands are gradually starting to tighten up. Kinda hard to explain, so here ya go.
- Knee pain. Sometimes bad…sometimes not. Sometimes in my right leg…sometimes in my left leg. Sometimes in the front of the knee…sometimes…well, you get the picture. Diagnosis: Osteoarthritis.
- Malignant Melanoma. Surgery August 17, 2021 to remove cancer and to see if it’s spread into lymph nodes. It did not!
- Got slammed by COVID three times (so far).
- CRACKED TOOTH. Had to get the damn thing pulled. Luckily it was one of my back teeth.
Yikes…that’s a lot!
It got me wondering if there was any connection between my constant health battles and celiac disease. So I did a survey, asking my fellow celiacs what other health issues and diseases have they dealt with. I heard back from over 1,000 people and oh…my…god!
I put together a word cloud, with the health issues mentioned the most in bigger font. All items on the word cloud were mentioned at least five times.
How many do you have on this list?
I remember I had a small wart problem when I was 8 – 12. An easy way you can get them removed is you can go to your dermatologist and they have treatment options.
Believe me…I tried everything. You know what finally worked? Baking soda and castor oil. Go figure.
100% spot on.
Please add Sjogrens to the list. It’s another fun immune system issue that causes systemic dryness and inflammation. It’s less well known, therefore, often takes longer to diagnose.
Thanks for al great and useful blog.
I was diagnosed with Celiac Disease in late 2018 at the age of 36, although the milder symptoms of the disease had probably been present for many years prior (which explains my issues with acid re-flux and dental acid corrosion). Incidentally, your cracked tooth could be the result of a lack of enamel on your teeth due to years of acid corrosion brought on by acid re-flux, or it could be due to nutrient malabsorption caused by damage to the villi in the gut.
At the same time that I started to develop the severe gastrointestinal symptoms of the disease, I also started to get Psoriasis on my elbows (my Mother has it on her elbows too). It turns out that Celiac and Psoriasis (both auto-immune diseases) share close inflammatory and genetic pathways and are both HLA genes located very closely on chromosome 6.
Anyway, I also had warts during childhood which I got from my Mum, and she in turn got them from her Mum, who in turn claims that they were the result of a Gypsy curse or something (not joking).
My 70 year old Mother who has Psoriasis, also has Rheumatoid Arthritis (yet another auto-immune disease caused by an HLA gene also located on chromosome 6).
I also have “nervous tics” which I developed at the age of five, but at the age of 29 it was eventually diagnosed with Tourette Syndrome (not Coprolalia though). Surprisingly, I inherited it from my Dad who apparently had it much worse than I ever did.
I had adult acne for as long as I can remember, but as soon as I was diagnosed with Celiac Disease and went on a gluten-free diet, it cleared up and the only time it ever flares up badly is if I have gluten. My first cousin (on my Mother’s side coincidentally) had adult acne for decades but she doesn’t have it anymore…. she was also diagnosed with Celiac Disease years ago.
You don’t need to answer this but I’d be interested to know. When I’m exposed to enough gluten to get a flare-up, I get the obvious toilet troubles, but I also get swollen lymph nodes under my arm pits and night sweats which give off a really pungent odour that smells like burnt sesame toast. Do you get any of these symptoms too, have you heard of anybody else who gets them or is it just me?