Who de hell is Hashimoto? (by Beenie Girl)

They say everything happens for a reason . . . My girl in New Delhi is known for her CAST-IRON stomach and so when they sent her to India I was not worried for her. To date she has not, I repeat, HAS NOT gotten ‘delhi belly’ and she has been there for what, a month now? So Delhi is the place for her.

Well I am still tryin to figure out why they sent my girl Sylph to Nigeria, but as soon as I figure that out I will let her know!**smile**

But I think I am beginning to figure out one of the reasons why I got sent to Cuba!

So I went to one of the hospitals here in Havana called Cira Garcia. Now, let me qualify this by saying, I do NOT like going to hospitals. I do not like the look of them, the smell of them, just the word hospital and I get antsy. I got dengue fever one time a few years ago and I refused to go to the hospital. In fact I think they were praying I would lose consciousness so that they could take me there without me knowing. I kept saying I would rather die comfortably in my own bed than go to the hospital and suffer. ESPECIALLY to the one in Tobago! (Ay, I am from Tobago so I could knock the hospital eh, I don't want nobody else bad mouthing the hospital, yuh hear!)
Added to which I have had some BAD experiences and also those of people close to me of people doing real nonsense to us in hospitals, so i have a kind of phobia.

Of course you would think that for someone who does not like hospitals that I would not get sick so all the time, but that is not the case with me - I tend to catch every cold that goes by, I had measles TWICE as a child (yea you're supposed to get those diseases once, right?), I'm allergic to everything except OXYGEN... As my girl in Delhi says "I ain't finish bake," I came out too early, so some things probably needed a bit more time!

Needless to say I have not been feeling well for a few weeks now, and I did go to see a doctor when I was at home, but with no relief even after I finished the entire course of medication they gave me, I thought let me go to the hospital here, but only only because I really was not feeling well, so I didn't want to risk it, plus I figured everyone is raving about the Cuban health system so let me give it a whirl. So I walked in with the results of the tests I took back home as well as the medication I was taking (medication which really made my tummy hurt by the way) To make a long story quite short, after the doctor laughed at the test results I brought with me and told me to throw away the medicine, within a week I had some new tests done and I was diagnosed with this condition called Hashimoto's Disease. Basically my immune system does not recognise my thyroid gland as part of my body anymore, so my antibodies are attacking it.
So let's say my immune system and my thyroid gland were living together all the time happily, but then one night poor Mr. Thyroid woke up to get some water to drink and Mrs. Immune System heard the noise, came down in the dark and, thinking it was an intruder, start hitting him in the head with a cricket bat, but no matter how much Mr. Thyroid says "it's meeee, ur boo" Mrs. Immune System is so bent on getting rid of intruders, that she keeps hitting the poor man. Of course this is not even close to what I was told was wrong with me back home, and from what I have read about this condition on the Internet I am lucky to have found out I have this before Mr. Thyroid dies from blunt force trauma, if yuh know what I mean.

So I am on some meds now, which I must admit for being only about 10 dollars in our money for a whole box of them, they are already making me feel a lot better. I think this place may do me well - good health care, affordable medication - sounds like a plan.

So they sent the one who always getting sick to Cuba! I knew there was some reason for them sending me here! If only I could figure out why they send Sylph to Nigeria. From reading that Bed story, I think she has a circulation problem she does not know about yet...