Ear Infections

I'm sort of writing this as therapy for dealing with two friends with ear infections in the past year. Both of these people are friends and very individualistic men like myself. The main difference between them and me is they didn't have to survive a heart virus at age 50 like I did in 1998 and 1999. This changed me a lot and allowed me to be more open to medical help. Because without both angels helping me and medical practitioners helping me I would have died. I needed both.

This time (my two friends at different times) tried to avoid going to doctors because: "Doctors are expensive" and both men are very frugal and efficient with money and neither at the time had chosen to have health care insurance because of having good health most of their lives just like me.

However, Health care insurance was something I started buying by about age 45 because I could afford it then and after and because it is all about probabilities in the end after you are about 40 years of age.

You might think you are invincible because you always have been. "I was like this too" from about age 15 (after I got over childhood epilepsy) until I got my heart virus in 1998.

So, my first friend almost went deaf in one ear because he didn't go to the doctor early enough. But, eventually he did and the doctor said he was just barely able to save his hearing.

This last weekend I visited my friends in Mt. Shasta and my daughter and a friend of hers met me there. However, I found out that my friend and his girlfriend had both had the H1N1 virus and my friend after he got rid of the H1N1 flu virus got a bad ear infection but he refused to go to a doctor because he didn't have insurance yet. So, the pressure built up until his eardrum perforated itself and pus started to come out of his ear.

When I arrived he told me how grateful he was that his ear had perforated itself and I asked if he had been to a doctor yet. He said "NO" but that he had spent many hours researching his ailment on the Internet as he has a masters degree from UCLA and is very studious naturally. However, I said to him, "Though you might generally know all about this sort of thing your personal symptoms might be unique to yourself. Why not visit an Ear, nose and throat specialist who has seen hundreds or thousands of these things and get his or her opinion?" He told me that doctors only recommend anti-biotics about 5% of the time for ear infections because usually they aren't helpful.

I said, "What about just seeing an ENT specialist to make sure everything is okay?" He said, "I'm signing up for health insurance right now." But then his girlfriend said, "But you won't be covered until april sometime because you are just signing up now."

Later I had to drive home and he told me his hearing had recovered in this ear after draining out some more. I was very happy to hear this and hoped this good news would continue.

Also, I have no doubt that eventually he will get to an ENT specialist. It is just a matter of time.