AFTER SUFFERING FROM A MYSTERIOUS ILLNESS FOR A DECADE,WOMAN COMES ACROSS THE STRANGEST CAUSE OF HER DISEASE
She was tired of everything. Years of treatment couldn’t help her. Nothing in the world seemed to aid her and cure that unknown disease. She was broken to the core. Her family life was shattering and her children couldn’t see her in that pain…
Imagine that you have been going through a tough phase in life and things aren’t turning any better rather they are getting worse day by day. One will lose hope and eventually would give up in life. Something similar happened with Kathi. This woman was suffering from an illness that couldn’t be diagnosed but only numerous symptoms were identified. And then suddenly one day a bathroom contractor working in her house discovers something in the furnace and her life turned upside down in seconds.
Knock Knock
It was any other day for Kathi. She was lying on the couch motionless when she heard the knock on the door. She pushed herself out of the piece of furniture and hunched towards the door using her walking stick. She was coughing badly. It was the contractors on the door. They had arrived for some repairs in the bathroom. Kathi didn’t know how will this repair cost her a lifetime.
They Screamed
As the contractors stepped upstairs to complete their job, Kathi locked the door and went back to lie on the couch-the place she would be resting all day. She was dull and was no more excited about anything in life. As she lay her legs on the couch and covered herself with a blanket, the contractors from the above screamed out her name. She was startled…
The Victim
Kathi Wison was a 41-year-old lady living in the town of Shelbyville, Indiana nearing the outskirts of Indianapolis. She was a very jolly woman always found smiling. She had a stable job at the Department Of Motor Vehicles. She had never let anything bother her much in life, little did she know that her mystery illness would change her as a person in whole.
Healthy Lifestyle
Kathi was never a fitness freak. Exercising and running for miles was never her cup of tea. However, she always had a healthy meal-a balanced diet. She was never into junk food much but opted for salads. The underlining point here is when she was so health-conscious then how did her mystery illness cripple her for a considerable period in her life. What was this mystery-disease she fell prey to?
Ten Years Ago
Keeping her healthy routine in mind, it was very strange when ten years back she fell ill. She was never even caught up with common cold and flu, and suddenly when her health faced a little inconvenience this time, it was so major that even years couldn’t recover her. Why were things so different this time?
One Day
What seemed to be a usual day, turned out to be the unexpected one. As Kathi woke this morning, she was not feeling easy. She was a little exhausted and at the same time felt a bit suffocated. She recalls that her body felt numb and lethargic. Though it was a very unusual thing for her, initially she didn’t worry about it much. Yet, soon only she was provided with reasons to question everything.
Maybe Common Cold
Kathi thought as her children feel lazy and exhausting due to the common cold, she might too be feeling such a thing because of common flu only. When she told about her ill-health that day, her daughter was worried, and she had all the reasons to worry. However, none knew that time, things were quite critical and deadly.
Work Stress
What Kathi was mistaking for cold, she even mistook it as a cause of her work stress. With the new project on Motors, Kathi had invested a lot of her energy and efforts at her job. She had been staying late up in night working which somewhere had stressed her out. She assumed that her health is just not able to cooperate with her changed hectic routine. With all this, something even profound happened.
Multivitamins
Just because she was feeling a worn-out and tired, she planned to have the prescribed multi-vitamins. Maybe with age and work stress, she was facing these symptoms. She had nearly all possible vitamin capsules ranging from Vitamin B-C-E and even mineral tablets of Zinc, Iron, Calcium, but nothing helped her. Her health was deteriorating.
Deteriorating
Now even Kathi’s family began worrying. The woman who never felt ill was sick and surprisingly was not able to recover even after weeks of rest. With each passing day, her exhaustion and tiresome problems manifolded. Each day she would wake up feeling worse than a day before. What was the matter?
Mysterious Symptoms
The symptoms that Kathi was facing were not new. Tiredness, headaches, coughing, and laziness was all related to the common cold and flu virus. But despite this, her health wasn’t recovering. She was not getting over of her cold. The symptoms were somehow turning mysterious. Even when she rarely had a cold, it would evade within a couple of days, this time it was too stubborn.
Need To Do Something
Fatigue took over Kathi. Her body grew sore. Her cold went so severe that she had almost lost her voice. Soon only she would have to face a bitter truth. When her multi-vitamins did not work as expected, she decided to do something. And this time though she took things in her own hands, they gradually shifted to an expert.
Not Helping
Kathi googled her symptoms, still could not find anything other than bacterial infection, virus, flu. She tried herbal treatments, countered her diet yet nothing seems to work out. As if things decided to get worse. Ashley, her daughter finally then took her to a doctor. While she hoped she’ll find a solution there to her mother’s condition, her hopes shattered on discovering the unexpected.
The Check-Up
Ashley took her mom to the nearby hospital to visit a doctor and get her mother’s disease diagnosed. After having a check-up the doctor as well told her that she is a prey to the flu may be due to exertion and weather-change. This was something they already knew. But when the expert confirmed it to be the same, their beating hearts calmed. However, things did not change for good.
Not Right
Even after the new set of medicines, Kathi’s health deteriorated and this time at an increasing rate. Suddenly, her face turned pale, she began to lose her appetite and would feel nauseous. Ashley was worried. She again took Kathi to the concerned doctor. And certainly, even the doctors were bothered now.
More Testing
On hearing about Kathi’s health, the experts were tensed. As Kathi was quite a healthy being, doctors expected that she would recover this illness. But she did not. They thus took some more tests on her. MRI, spine tests, hormonal tests, and some blood tests were performed on her. Every possible disease the doctors could think of was Kathi tested for. And as the reports came, everyone was left completely baffled.
Waiting And Hoping
Kathi and her family were just hoping that the doctors are able to decode her mysterious illness. Since all the possible tests were performed, they were quite sure that somewhere in any report, Kathi’s illness would be detected. Finally, Kathi would be able to live a stable life. Unfortunately, The Wilsons didn’t know that it was not that easy.
That’s Strange
The results of the tests were shocking. Not even a single medical report showed any sought of deviation. Kathi’s mysterious disease could not get a name. Reports were normal, but her stress levels were extremely high. A question raised in minds of doctors that whether Kathi’s problem was psychological? What exactly was causing her this mysterious illness? As time passed, things continued to ruin and even Kathi’s family began losing their faith in her. And then, her life took an unbelievable twist…
Over The Years
For nearly the next ten years, Kathi visited the doctors. Her family did everything they could to help their family member feel better. Even Dr. Hensley provided her with the best medical treatments. Right from ensuring bed rest to a sedentary life and even herbal treatments, nothing helped this lady. Just as Kathi started to believe that there was no cure for her disease, the stranger – bathroom repairman turned her life 360.
Affected All Lives
Kathi’s unknown disease and illness took a toll on all her relationships. Her personal and professional life was badly affected. While she could no longer work, staying at home further depressed her. With all this, her mental health was severely impacted. People started saying that her illness is in her mind and not in reality. Maybe she is hallucinating or suffering from a psychological disorder. It was at its peak and Kathi decided to divert her attention to her house and then called the contractors.
Madam Madam
When Kathi again went off to sleep, the contractors who came to repair her bathroom screamed from the floor above, “Madam, Madam”. Kathi got up with a jerk and gathered all her energy to rush upstairs. The repairmen then asked her a question which shocked her for a second. What made the repairmen question and scream at the sight of the bathroom?
The Water Heater
The contractor asked Kathi, “When was your water heater installed”? It took a little long for Kathi to recall exactly when did she got that installed. And after a few minutes of thinking she said, “some ten years back, but what is the matter?” Little did Kathi know that a revelation about this water heater was all that she needed in the last ten years of her illness.
Installed Incorrectly
As Kathi said ten years ago, the contractors were scared. They were tensed. They told Kathi that this water heater had been installed in an incorrect way. The furnace and the water heater did not fit in, correctly due to which quite a lot of carbon monoxide gas must have been leaking into the house over all these years. What was this horrifying thing about this gas?
Poisonous One
Carbon monoxide though is an odorless and colorless gas, it is a deadly one. The gas is said to be a silent killer. It is so harmful to the human body that when diffused in blood it can cause massive damage to vital organs like the heart, brain, and eyes. Prolonged exposure to this had even critical effects. Was this the case which the doctors missed to diagnose Kathi with?
Similar Symptoms
The repairman further told Kathi that as they have been inhaling this gas for this long, symptoms like that of nausea, painful headaches, suffocation, fatigue, and chest pain were likely for them to experience. Moreover, in major cases, it can even cause vomiting, unconsciousness, and confusion. Certain studies even show that this gas is so dangerous that many people have ended in death due to its exposure. Kathi could somehow now connect her illness with all this.
Makes Sense
Kathi could connect all these dots. She realized that since the day this water heater was installed, her health began facing issues. Before that, she was perfectly fine and led her normal life. Moreover, all the symptoms which the contractor was telling were similar to all the mysterious symptoms she was facing in all these years.
Knight In A Shining Armor
The repairman came as a ray of sunshine in Kathi’s life. The illness which she was absolutely tired off was finally, at last, diagnosed. The case of her mysterious disease came to a closure that too by an unexpected man. After spending a good fortune on hospital and medical bills and returning home absolutely hopeless, this visitor could provide her with the much-needed answers.
Smiling Faces
Kathi hugged her husband the very moment. She could not believe that after struggling with her deteriorating health for nearly a decade, she found what she was exactly suffering from. Probably now she will be able to get the appropriate medical help and continue as a healthy being in life. This repairman did the unbelievable for this woman.
Getting Normal
The repairman right then fixed the issue. He connected the entire apparatus in the right manner. And as time passed by Kathi could feel a change in her condition. Her fatigue evaded slowly. However, as she was facing this issue since quite really long, all her symptoms did not fade away in a second. She was recovering but at a slow pace.
Excited Daughter
Ashley was over the moon when she came to know about this incident. Even she couldn’t absorb that her mother’s illness was coming from a piece of electric equipment that was installed when she was just a kid. She recalls how her mother’s condition just worsened. And now that she would be eventually recovering, the duo could hang out and shop together.
High-Spirited
Kathi was getting back to the track. She started back with her job. She says, ” My body, mind, and spirit is back. In the last ten years, I have never felt this good.” All she did was bed rest and lay in bed like a lifeless man. But now she could feel the new energy in herself.
Grateful
Kathi soon recovered from her illness. And she was grateful to everyone who has helped her in this tough phase of her life. Though the doctors could not find the exact ailment she was facing, she still was grateful to them for their time and dedication with her. More than anyone, she was grateful to the repairman who gave her a new life.
Spreading Awareness
After her recovery, Kathi decided to spread awareness about the cause of her illness to everyone. She didn’t wish that what she has gone through, any other man suffers the same. She talked about the ill-effects about the poisonous carbon monoxide gas.
Alarm
People must get an alarm installed in their homes which could detect the poisonous fumes. If such colorless gases are detected at the right time, people’s health could be spared of the harmful effects. No one could even imagine that just a gas they inhaled unknowingly can take them to a disease which even doctors can’t figure out. Thus, such an alarm was important.
Trusting Myself
In the end, Kathi was just glad that she trusted her instincts. Even after the doctors and experts said that she was physically fit, she knew she wasn’t. Moreover, she never let the thoughts of people claiming her to be a patient of mental disorder and a hypochondriac bother her.
All we hope is that Kathi has a steady and happy and healthy life ahead.
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