"Dear bison..." OR "Let me help you help me help you"

[InchoateHand]

Dear Bison,

Suppose someone had a chronic illness. He or she experience it asymptomatically, so as foolish as this is, this individual hasn't really changed his or her (mostly) unhealthy routines.

The treatment for said illness would take between 36-48 weeks, and be accompanied with major discomfort, possibly to the point of severely impacting work/graduate work. The treatment also has somewhere between a 25% and 50% effectiveness, determinable midway through the course at earliest.

In the nearterm medical horizon, it looks like there may well be new therapies.

Should this special someone,
Wait for them?
Aggressively undergo treatment now, before more damage is done?
Take time off of work/school to seek treatment?
Just seek the treatment anyway, and if the above suffers, deal with it then?
Just ignore it and maybe it'll go away?


Thanks.

[jason_t]

[ QUOTE ]
Dear Ten7,

Make an omelot.

[/ QUOTE ]

Dear bison,

What did you think of the movie Spellbound?

Sincerely,

Jason.

[razor]

[ QUOTE ]
There's no law against it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Your knowledge of Canadian law is astonishing.

[DavidC]

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Dear Bison:

If a woman, who was never very feminine in the first place, has to get a double mastectomy, followed by a hysterectomy and loses all of her hair due to chemotheraphy, is it safe to say she is now a hemaphrodite? Or is there some other terminology for someone who has lost all traces of their "sex?"

In addition, would you consider marrying a woman like this? Even if you were in love with her? Knowing she had no breasts, knowing she could not have children and had not a hair left on her body?

Naturally, I'm asking this for a friend of mine, lol. [img]/images/graemlins/blush.gif[/img]

Felicia [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

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I'm sorry to hear about this. With Chemo, you regrow your hair eventually, right? I certainly wouldn't use the term hermaphrodite, as she's still got her vagina, just no uterus, and hermaphrodite has some pretty negative connotations.

I've heard that if they're not careful during a hysterectomy they can sever nerves that lead to the inner vagina, leading to a loss of stimulation during sex... and so you should be informed when talking to your doctor about the risk of this and what they can do to avoid it if anything.

I'm pretty optimistic about these things. I'd say that if the people are currently involved and they love eachother, then it should be something that they can get through.

I hope everything works out okay.

--Dave.

[Blarg]

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loooooooooloooooooooooooolllllllllloooooooooolllll l

It's true, duders. There's a reason they're hugely popular.

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My experience with multiple night school programs is that they're mostly older people extremely busy with their lives and often very tired. They work a full day, slam some junk food into their face while traffic jamming it over to school, run to hit their class in time, and by 9 or 10 a night when the class is over, they're burnt out and still haven't had a moment's peace or maybe pleasure all day.

They don't hang around and chat or anything; they sprint out of class ASAP and try to do whatever they can in the hour or three they have before sleeping, to try to do their coursework and take care of everything in their life that really matters.

Going to school in the daytime is vastly more social than at night. Night school is all business and deadly serious. You've got adults who are there for a purpose and then gone, not kids who are having daddy pay their way through life and have tons of time to burn to hang around and meet and try to date new people.

That's if you're in a program, anyway. Maybe it's different if you're just taking classes in Chinese cooking or pottery or something.

[bisonbison]

Dear Inchoate,

Assuming that the disease involves continuing physical damage, and that you're already experiencing some deterioration from normal, I'm heavily inclined toward treatment. The fact is, you may not know when the effects of the illness will shift for you from manageable to life-impacting, and, giving this advice, I'd rather err on the side of caution, taking the time off and dealing with problems as they come up.

I'll also say that new therapies are rarely delivered on time.

However, understand that I'm talking out my ass here, and that your best course of action would be to get a second opinion from a specialist at an institution where you would not be receiving treatment.

[chesspain]

[ QUOTE ]
Try leaving the house.

Yes, that would be an example of the concise, well-reasoned advice I'll be giving.

[/ QUOTE ]

And he stole it from me, to boot.

[bisonbison]

I was really referring to rec leagues and social lists and stuff.

[DavidC]

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If you're looking to re-establish order in your borderless life, a job is the easiest, most drastic way to do it. You have to get up in the morning, you can't skip...

[/ QUOTE ]

Damnit.

You make a good point.

I only manage to get to karate about once to twice a week, rather than 3-4 times, because of the lack of urgency about it.

(I've recently gotten into it because over the years I've lost my ability to concentrate, rather than for exercise / self-defense.)

[SpearsBritney]

Dear Bison,

How the hell do you read/type so fast?