I was stressed over nothing. My doctor was just telling me things I already knew. She just didn't know that I knew! She believes that I'm only liver affected, but there is a small chance that my lungs could be affected as well. Frankly, I'm thankful for that because the idea of emphysema scared me to death. I always kind of assumed the liver disease would continue to progress, so cirrhosis doesn't scare me as much.

My doctor told me that she's never had a patient with this disease (it's pretty rare) so she's sending me to a liver specialist to whom she's already consulted about my history. She thinks that he'll probably schedule a liver biopsy. But I'll know more in October when I see him.

This may sound silly, but it's kind of a relief to finally know what's wrong with me, even though it's pretty serious. It's been 20 years of not knowing; so I never knew if it was something I was doing, or what I could possibly do that would make it worse. That's pretty hard to live with. Now I know. That's a relief.

Amazing that a small town doctor found this, after I've been to some of the best gastro's out there, huh? I gave her a hug and thanked her for being so thorough. She seemed very pleased that I recognized her efforts. She wants my kids to get tested, especially after asking about their health history. It makes me sad that I've potentially passed this on.

I think this is the last of these scary posts. Now I can move on to being my normal smartass self.