I am a TB patient and I will get better.

The other day I woke up to intense uncontrollable coughing, as if something in my chest wanted out immefiately. I went straight to the bathroom and coughed it out, thinking it was my chronic cough getiing worse with phlegm. But it was very dark red. I kept coughing for what seemed to be five minutes.

A lot of things rushed across my mind as I spat out gobs of my lungs. But the most persistent was the question “why?” I thought it was a cruel cosmic joke, not on myself but on the people I care about.

The emergency people at Makati Med recommended that I go straight to a pulmonary specialist, since the treatment they would administer would have been the same as the specialist’s, but that would have doubled my hospital fees. Made sense.

The thing about TB is that it is curable. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), nearly 2 billion people—one third of the world’s population—have been exposed to the tuberculosis pathogen^. Annually, 8 million people become ill with tuberculosis, and 2 million people die from the disease worldwide. (Wikipedia)

I dunno where I got it, who knows? I’m determined to defeat it even though at times it does feel like it’s easier if iI let it get me. The coughing bouts are no way near comfortable, and I feel very weak afterwards. I wear a face mask 24/7, the surgical kind which can trap very small particles, but it makes my already laboured breathing a little more difficult. And I have nothing much to do isolated in my room. Occasionally I’d go out to get food and water, or when I go to the bathroom. Or when I go out of the house to burn my mask, which is a daily routine.

Thank goodness for Facebook, I still get to talk to my friends. Just now on my second day, I am already missing them a lot. Drew, thanks for patiently chatting with me everyday. I feel normal that way.

I will be in intensive isolation between two weeks an a month, depending on my check-up at the end of this month. After that, I’ll be maintaining the same medication for another month. Dunno what happens after that, but I am assured that so long as I keep to my meds, I’ll be seeing my friends normally after two months, although still in medication.

Cooperation is important, from the people you live with at home and the people you worked around with. They must be checked out for infection and must be educated about the disease and ways it can be handled.

I will be posting my progress as often as I can. I hope people learn from this, that it is a common illness but very much treatable.

In the meantime, I plan to get a particular kind of fish, called Betta, to keep me company in my isolaton.

Vives

my name means “you live”