Human After All

This will be the last time that i write about being sick. I'm not looking for pity or tears, i'm merely chronicling what its like to walk around feeling like a giant bacteria cell for 3 weeks.

towards the end of the hannah montana tour my allergies began to bother me. john taylor will tell you this is because i am an inferior human and weak. ...he's probably right. four days at home between tours is barely a rest and before i knew it i was back on the road again and my stuffy nose had become part of regular life. but about 3 weeks ago, i started feeling really tired and began coughing up thick dark yellow phlegm. great mental picture, right? to make a short story long, i saw a doctor and he told me i have bronchitis. what made that news even more fun, was that my left ear had clogged up and i could no longer hear out of it! YES!!! so awesome!

i wont bore you with details, but my typical day consisted of: lying in bed until about 3pm, soundcheck, laying down on a couch in the dressing room for more hours, pounding vitamin waters before the show, playing a concert, going back to sleep.

so why was i sick for 3 weeks? what made me better? what is the meaning of life? all great questions, i'm glad you asked. the first doctor i saw gave me an antibiotic that was weak and did nothing to me. the second doctor took x rays of my chest and found this inside my right lung:

he said the snake in my lung was a normal side effect of bronchitis and would eventually go away.

the third doctor i saw gave me another antibiotic to drain the fluid clogging my ear so i could get the equilibrium in my head balanced again. all this did was dehydrate me and send me into my first ever anxiety attack which, like i've been saying all along, was awesome!

the 4th doctor i saw was a genius. dr. k from chicago. he explained to me why i got sick in the first place by drawing diagrams and giving me vocabulary words. i was back in college. he prescribed me an oral steroid. my hope was already gone, but i thanked him and went on stage to play. i kid you not, 24 hours after seeing this doctor and taking the oral steroid, i feel human again. dr. k is a miracle worker. i cant thank this guy enough. my ear popped, my bronchitis is gone, i'm making bad jokes again...basically everything is back to normal. see kids, steroids arent so bad. jose canseco? nbd:

dont worry the steroid i took was very different. i'll still be the same scrawny kid you've come to know and love.
i'd like to thank the doctors i saw in Houston, Los Angeles, Grand Rapids, and Chicago. The nurse and security team in Peoria. As well as the EMS squad in Chicago. There were several occasions when i almost passed out right before the concert was about to start and these people were there to help me get out and play a show. for the hour and a half that i play music on stage every day, it was like i wasnt sick at all. thats not to say i didnt crawl into my bunk after the shows and drink gallons of water and pop pills. but i love my job, and while most people stay home from work when they're ill, working was the best part of my day.

i'm back.