HIV+ friend update
I was almost ready to leave for work this morning when the 'phone rang. It was my HIV+ friend in Denver. Of course I answered.
He's going to get a blood count this week, but last time his T-cells were at 268.
He might have cancer. There's something else that needs to get cleared up before the doctor will do a biopsy (I'll spare you the details), so it probably won't get done until January.
He doesn't have multiple sclerosis. He does have an infection in his brain. The way he put it was they sent him to see these neurologists who are all in their late twenties, just out of med school. They all said, "I have no idea what is wrong with you." Then after a few weeks of that, they finally brought out some guy in his sixties who looked at him and said, "I know exactly what's wrong with you. I haven't seen this in twenty years." It's some infection that was much more common before a lot of the HIV drugs came on the market. He's going to be doing physical therapy on the parallel bars, to retrain his brain.
He had been on some drug (he told me the name, but I forget) that he said gave him extremely vivid and horrible nightmares. Bloody and gory, and sometimes he couldn't wake himself up, and when he could, the nightmare would start right over when he fell back to sleep, "in a different country." He's not taking those anymore.
He said he took the dog out for a walk this morning, and they only made it to the corner because the cold makes all the pain worse (windchill of almost thirty below in Denver this morning, ours was "only" twenty below).
He's going to get a blood count this week, but last time his T-cells were at 268.
He might have cancer. There's something else that needs to get cleared up before the doctor will do a biopsy (I'll spare you the details), so it probably won't get done until January.
He doesn't have multiple sclerosis. He does have an infection in his brain. The way he put it was they sent him to see these neurologists who are all in their late twenties, just out of med school. They all said, "I have no idea what is wrong with you." Then after a few weeks of that, they finally brought out some guy in his sixties who looked at him and said, "I know exactly what's wrong with you. I haven't seen this in twenty years." It's some infection that was much more common before a lot of the HIV drugs came on the market. He's going to be doing physical therapy on the parallel bars, to retrain his brain.
He had been on some drug (he told me the name, but I forget) that he said gave him extremely vivid and horrible nightmares. Bloody and gory, and sometimes he couldn't wake himself up, and when he could, the nightmare would start right over when he fell back to sleep, "in a different country." He's not taking those anymore.
He said he took the dog out for a walk this morning, and they only made it to the corner because the cold makes all the pain worse (windchill of almost thirty below in Denver this morning, ours was "only" twenty below).