Bizarre Medical Conditions You've Had

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

Catherine–it’s probably a normal reaction, just not to my degree. For instance, we went through Pensacola over Spring Break. We spent two hours out on the beach on a perfectly bright, sunny day. When we got back to the house where we were staying, I almost immediately zonked out and slept for three hours, even though I had gotten a full night’s sleep for the past several days. The same thing happened more than once on that trip, which is what made me think it wasn’t normal. Then again, I don’t think it’s a problem or anything–more of a “quirk”.

C3–I figure it is related to the reaction in those with SLE. I don’t have any other symptoms (I am tired a lot of the time, but that’s attributable to “med student disease”) and as a white male, lupus is quite unlikely. “Total body exhaustion” is a good way to put it, though, although I don’t have the aching joints or headache. Do I remember right that the effect of sunlight on people with SLE is usually cumulative and very delayed, such that it hits them in the wintertime?

Dr. J

PS: Every time I ever saw “cat scratch fever” listed as a choice on a test, that guitar riff would pop into my head. Very annoying.

22

Well, there’s a thread in the Pit in which I describe my current medical woes. Right now, I’m not sure what I have. All I can say is that it’s characterized by pea-sized flat yellow growths on my knuckles, two per knuckle on the middle and ring fingers on my right hand, and one on the index finger, with a new one growing on the ring finger of my left hand, as well as some that might be the same thing and might not on the pads of my right thumb, right and left middle fingers, and the base of my left index finger at the top of my palm. I’ve been looked at by two residents and two attendings, I’ve had six of them frozen off, and then had the second attending tell me that that was probably a mistake on the first attending’s part. God only knows what I have. I know the doctors sure as hell don’t.

Another nice little undiagnosed thing I get every now and then is absolutely no fun at all, and also has to do with my hands (I have more fucked-up medical problems with my hands than I do with any other part of my body times ten). Every now and then–this has happened 3 times since I was 15–I will get a horrible rash that is localized on the underside of my hands, both my palms and the palm-side of my fingers. It looks and feels like hives–they’re tiny bumps almost UNDERNEATH the skin, and they itch and swell and hurt. My palms and fingers turn a violent red color. This is no fun at all, but it gets worse. In about three days, the rash goes down, and the peeling begins. Eventually, the groups of blisters will dry out, and most people know what happens when blisters dry out. The skin on top dies. About a day after the rash is gone, I notice little white bubbles of skin. Eventually, most of the skin on my palms and fingers can be pulled off in giant chunks. This doesn’t feel too nice either. The doctors who looked at me for this claimed it to be contact dermatitis. Nobody knows what I came in contact with, though. We can only assume that it came from touching something that someone else had touched, and that someone else had something on their hands that irritated mine. The first time I got it was right after going putt-putting, the second time I’d just gone shopping and was pushing around a cart, and I’m not sure about the third time. Either way, I wish I knew what it was that was irritating me so much, so I know to stay away from it. God forbid I buy a new lotion or perfume, only to find out that I’m horribly allergic to it.

23

Drain Bead - one word: CLARITIN.

I can now sleep with a cat on my face and not have an allergic reaction. The stuff may work for you, too.

24

Hey, Drain, I get the same sort of thing (course, don’t know that it’s exactly the same thing around my fingernails): little tiny clusters of blisters underneath the skin–most no larger than the periods in this message.

I’ve been treating it with a topical anti-fungal which keeps it at bay, but if I back off for just a few days, it comes right back with a vengeance.

Six months now. . . .

25

Man oh man. That’s gotta suck.

My senior year in high school, I had something called Psuedo Tumor Cerebrum. It had to do with medication I had taken. See, I went to the dermatologist because I had some old zit scars (not nasty, but mom’s insurance covered it and she didn’t mind) from past popping incidences, so I got Retin-A. The doc also gave me monocyclin, which he promised would stop me from getting zits except around that time of the month.

Should’ve known the guy was a wacko.

So, I started getting killer headaches. I nearly passed out in Health class on monday and stayed home tuesday. My mom got me some Exedrine migraine, which held the pain at bay, and then my vision got AFU. I saw everything double, almost like I was permanently cross eyed. So I went to the doctor and after a brain cancer scare, he told me what I had.

Apparently, 90% of overweight (which I was then) white teenage girls get PTC from monocycline. The drug made my body produce excess spinal fluid, which then shoved my brain forward into my skull, which then caused my optic nerves to swell. It felt like if someone just hammered a nail in my head, the pain would go away - pressue headaches. So after TWO spinal taps, I was ok, although I also got a ultrasound on my eye, which was waaaay cool. I also have drusea (sp?), which means my optic nerves look funny. Hmmmmm.

By the way, I set a new record for the amount of spinal fluid removed from a human at Johns Hopkins. Yay!!

I know, it doesn’t beat the new ass hole, but I tried. :slight_smile:

26

Every so often after I’ve been standing a lot (Usually while umpiring) I’ll get a burning sensation on my left thigh. The skin around the area seems to have lost some sensativity too. It burns from right above the knee cap on the outside of my thigh, up about 8 - 12 inches. I described this to a friend of mine and he said I had a pinched nerve? Anyone else ever heard of this?

There is also one other symptom, that may or may not be related. Sometimes I get a real harsh pain in my lower knee cap, and across the top of my toes. Both at the same time. It usually only lasts for a couple of seconds.

Any ideas? Bueller? Bueller?

27

Every so often after I’ve been standing a lot (Usually while umpiring) I’ll get a burning sensation on my left thigh. The skin around the area seems to have lost some sensativity too. It burns from right above the knee cap on the outside of my thigh, up about 8 - 12 inches. I described this to a friend of mine and he said I had a pinched nerve? Anyone else ever heard of this?

There is also one other symptom, that may or may not be related. Sometimes I get a real harsh pain in my lower knee cap, and across the top of my toes. Both at the same time. It usually only lasts for a couple of seconds.

Any ideas? Bueller? Bueller?

28

I can’t compete with the new asshole, but I can tell you that you are not alone. one of my exes woke up with this condition, an abscess above his anus, he had to get it drained surgically.

I specialize in weird, unknown ailments, and if they are known, my body has to throw a twist in, either make it worse that anyone else’s of just a little different.

-When I was in grade three twice in a row I cam down with a mysterious ailment that cause high fever,(105-106), nausea, cramps, extreme diarrhea, sore throat and vomitting. I was unable to keep on or gain any weight. Eventually, after losing around 30 lbs (i was skeletal) I just woke up hungry and fine. this illness got me twice and I never found out what it was.

-I caught mono while in grade eight. Which was a pain, but would’ve been fine if I tested positive for mono, but no! I tested positive for leukemia! I was the only kid I knew that was happy to find out she had mono.

-I had my appendix removed in grade nine, except once they got in there thay found out it was not inflamed. Hmm, wonder what was causing that pain?

-My wisdom teeth. I was swollen and bruised for a whole month. My bottom jaw bones were exposed (boy, does that hurt). I developed a sensitivity to tylenol that caused my stomach to be hyperacidic whenever I took one (read projectile vomiting). Finally after a onth I looked like anormal human, well, as normal as I ever did.

-Canker sores - I get canker sores down the bottom of both sides of my jaw whever I am stressed. Any thoughts on how to eleminate them? I have tried numerous OTCs.

29

DrJ - I’ve never heard about the cumulative/delayed affect of sunlight for lupus patients and it’s not something that happens with me. Usually, if I go out in the sun for an extended period (1+ hours), I get very tired and achy that day. If I go rest, I feel fine later, with no other symtpoms. My doctor never mentioned that, either. That doesn’t necessarily mean it doesn’t happen, though. My lupus has been under control for a long time and I generally don’t have any problems. I’ve been off medication for 10 years, keeping healthy by maintaining a low stress life.

30

I once developed an allergy to my own eyelashes… or the little beasties that live there. Weird, and it could happen again, so I have meds.

DoctorJ - I work for a foundation that assists people with the various bullous diseases classified as Pemphigus. You learn about those yet?

31

Strange conditions? I’ve had a few.

Whenever I walk around on cold linoleum, I get hives on the bottoms of my feet, they itch so bad, and are so painful I can hardly walk.

When I was younger, my eyes would swell up for no known reason. Occassionally, I’d notice that hey, my eye is swelling up. It would usually be gone by the next morning.

When I was a little kid, my legs would ache so bad at night that my dad would have to come in and massage my leg muscles until I stopped crying and fell asleep. It happened about once a month or so.

I have such dry skin. I have to use two to four squirts of lotion on my hands and lower arms every time I get out of the shower, and about a squirt every hour or so after that.

Poysyn, it sounds like you may have had what one of my friends had. One day, he just started having terrible diarrhea. This continued for a while, until he also started vomiting whenever he’d try to eat anything. So, he was losing food at both ends. They finally put him in the hospital on IV just so his body would be getting nutrients. He was so weak he couldn’t walk, or hardly move. Any time he’d try to eat anything, he’d vomit it back up. His entire digestive system below his throat just… shut down. He went from about 160 to just over 100 lbs. They finally shipped him up to the Mayo clinic to see some fancy shmancy doctor. The doctor had just finished a study on this exact condition. Apparently, Jeff was one of only 26 people to EVER be diagnosed with this. It’s supposed to be like strep, everyone has the bug, but normally it doesn’t bother you. With him, for some reason, it kicked in and shut down his digestive system. Now he takes antibiotics that keep it under control.

–Tim

32

  1. My current weird condition is strangulation. Sometimes (only rarely) I feel like someone’s strangling me. I can breathe perfectly, however, there’s just pain and tension. I can’t find anything I’m allergic too, though. Mr. Na won’t comment when I ask him what he does when I’m sleeping. :smiley:

  2. I faint for no apparent reason, usually during the summer. Actually there is a reason–I have chronic low blood pressure (90/70), but doctors really don’t understand why.

  3. I have very dry, flaky skin on my torso, and it’s spreading at an unseemly rate. No redness or itching, just flakes. Docs can’t figure that one out either.

  4. I had chicken pox at age 20, then promptly got shingles. I’m really looking forward to the regular outbreaks of shingles when I’m eighty.

33

I forgot about my sinuses. Now, sinusitis isn’t exactly weird or unusual, but the amount and magnitude of problems I’ve had with mine is.

I had recurrent sinus infections for years, especially in college. I was having them on a nearly monthly basis–and if untreated, they tended to spread to my lungs and evolve into bronchitis, or, on one occasion, pneumonia. After years, of dealing with this, my nurse practitioner got fed up and sent me for an MRI. What it showed was apparently remarkable. She told me “I have never seen so many things wrong in one CAT scan.” (I assume she meant in sinuses.) I had cysts in the ethnoid sinuses, a huge polyp in the left maxillary sinus, a severely deviated septum, a large bone spur growing off the septum (that essentially closed off the right sinus cavities; even my untrained eye could see how obviously malformed and narrow they were–the doctors were surprised I could breathe out of my right sinus at all!), and cysts in the right maxillary sinus. Surgery was scheduled, and what was planned to be a 2-hour procedure turned into 4 hours as they was even more to discover once they went in: a second cyst blocking the tear duct/drainage area of the left maxillary, and a completely missing mucosal membrane in the right sinus. They had to make one, however that is done!

Oh, and as far as the “new asshole,” that’s not exactly it. The cyst presented itself as a divot about 5" above the anus, deep enough to put the tip of my pinky in. Apparently, the way these cysts work is they start in one place, then slowly make a trail until they reach the skin surface. Yeah, it was gross, but it wasn’t obvious, painful, or too foul–it was too small to be. However, it did require cutting out that trail, all 5" of it. It just missed the rectal wall.

And Omni, all I have to show for it is a bright pink scar in my crack. It takes effort to see it, and you’re most certainly not going to. :wink: The cyst wasn’t particularly visible when it was there, anyway. And patting me on the ass–not that I’m a fan of you doing that, anyway–is no problem as it’s about 8" below the surgery site.

The worst part of that cyst is I waited nearly 2 years to see a doctor about it. Can you imagine? I was so humilated and ashamed of my body I was afraid to see someone (meanwhile, I just watched myself for other symptoms; when none arose, it was just easier to do nothing). The surgery was certainly humiliating–my butt cheeks were taped wide open–and the doctor had a horrible bedside manner. I was so ashamed I started crying. When a more sympathetic nurse asked why (the doctor was actually annoyed I was crying!), I told her “It’s just a little humiliating.” She comforted me a little and reassured me, “This is nothing. Wait until you’re giving birth.” We chuckled, and I felt better.

34

#1. “After years, of dealing with this…” That kind of comma error drives me batty.

#2. I said I had an MRI then a CAT scan. DER! I had a CAT scan, dammit. I have no idea where the MRI comment came from.

Other info I forgot to mention: Doctors speculated I may have had the same sinus infection for nearly four years. As the sinuses were unable to drain the infection due to all of the above listed problems, it’s likely I had one that would go into remission while I was on antibiotics, then flare up almost immediately after going off of them.

And one more weird thing: My feet peeled when I was a child. 100% cotton socks remedied that problem. Weird.

35

**

You mean he’s immunodefficient? or he had TSS?

Both can cause you to suffer the infection of common microbes that are found in your body as helper microbes.

THat’s usually th sign of bad things…

-Sam

36

I have a tooth (one of many) growing inside my mouth. Only, it is in the middle. Of the roof or my mouth. The exact middle. And it’s growing UP. UPwards. The tooth is POINTING UP. The roots grow down. Into my mouth. Luckily, it isn’t actually MOVING up, otherwise they’d have to operate. It’s just kind of there. Fun at parties!

37

I don’t know how odd this is…but I don’t know anyone else with this problem.
I have reoccuring dislocation of the jaw. And it is very painful when it happens. Mostly I’m just very careful when I open my mouth, whether I’m yawning, or whatever. I can feel it go out, and I get lucky some of the time and it pops back in. But, I really panic, almost immediately if it doesn’t pop in. I have to go to the emergency room and have a doctor close my mouth. Once when I was pregnant; and had morning sickness really bad, it went out 3 times in one night. Believe me, the doctor was as upset as I was about coming out 3 times to shut my mouth.
It doesn’t happen often anymore, I think because I’m so careful about it. I have noticed that it is more likely to go out when I’ve been under a lot of stress. I don’t know if it’s because I’m not being as careful then, or if it is related to the fact that a person is more likely to clamp their jaws under stress (and I know that clamping your jaws hard makes the problem worse).
I was supposed to have surgery for this problem over 20 years ago, but my then-husband was ever so thoughtful and quit his job right after I gave birth (and a month b4 the surgery was scheduled) so I had no insurance. I then lived for the next 15 years without insurance, and haven’t really had enough of a problem with it since to make it worthwhile.

38

When my dad was in his early 20s, he also dislocated his jaw. However, they found what the problem was: his teeth didn’t meet straight across when he bit down, so the cartilage got damaged on one side. When he yawned or spent time with his head flung back (as in painting a ceiling), his jaw would just pop out. He went to a dentist (that was 40 years ago) who made this kind of bridge of a clear, plastic-like material (I never knew the name of this stuff) which fit right over his back teeth so his jaws came down properly. This thing lasted 35 years, then cracked. Dad fixed it with Crazy Glue but after half a dozen fixes, it was gone. He went to a dentist again to see if he could get another one of these bridges. The guy looked at it, and said that to make one of these today, it would cost several thousand dollars! Good thing my dad was working for the government at the time - professionals can experiment all they want, it seems! Anyhow, he just got a regular bridge to fix the height of his teeth.

Did I have a point?..

39

Ruffian, I’ve been there with the pilonidal cyst thing.:frowning: I also had cystic acne, so I waited too long for anybody to look at it both because it was embarrassing and because i thought it was just another cyst that would go away eventually. How wrong I was. It got large and quite painful, and it was very hard to sit down or stand up confortably. Sounds like my scar is much bigger, more like 2 inches long. I literally am butt-ugly! My surgeon also had a terrible bedside manner.

And then there was the time the office here at work flooded, and we had to work in here with a damp carpet that looks and smells every one of the 30+ years it’s been here. (There’s asbestos under there so it would be very expensive and difficult to replace!)

Anyway after 3 or 4 days of damp carpet and fans blowing junk everywhere I started to develop… something… uh… whitish… growing on my uvula.

Eventually it mostly went away, but at my next dental appointment, my dentist noticed yellowish spots on my tongue. Gave me some antifungal tablets and acted very very worried that it could be the sign of something far worse and that I couldn’t possibly have gotten it from the carpet becuase that kind of thing isn’t usually airborne. He said I more likely got it through some sort of personal contact ahem, but I’m afraid to say that at the time in my life the possiblity of that was practically nil, thankyouverymuch. Besides, as soon as I was away from the office for the weekend, it started to get better. Not a coincidence, I think…

40

Does gout count?

If I eat too much red meat or something like oysters, I’ll get a gout attack. I can honestly say that I’d rather have my big toes removed than go through a gout bout. Indomethacin can stop an attack in its tracks if I take it soon enough.

For an idea of what gout feels like: Pry apart the joints of your big toes. Now pour in some ground glass. Then go kick the wall.

I’ve been told it’s hereditary. I sure hope my son never gets it.