Hashimoto's en-snuffleupagus

I am just going to start by saying how much I hate human's lack of understanding of statistics....

Here I am with some form of cancer that affects old, chain-smoking men.... Then it jumps from the right side of my head to my left, which "never" happens. Then I find out my good friend has this weird disease, Hashimoto's Encephalopathy, that is diagnosed in patients about a dozen times a year or something ridiculous. THEN, I go with Jake to the neurologist this afternoon and he also has Hashimoto's Encephalopathy????? Is there something in the water in Tucson? What is going on?

For those of you who don't know, Jake, my husband, has been dealing with unexplainable chronic pain for the past 2.5 years. It started in the back of his legs when sitting, then traveled to his back, and makes it so he is uncomfortable all the time. It got to the point where he couldn't even sit to play video games. *gasp* He's seen countless doctors with various specialties and just recently wound up in a neurologist office. The neurologist ran some tests and this afternoon we found out that the only abnormality in the entire batch was that his Hashimoto's antibodies were 10 times the normal level. Apparently they are attacking the neurons in his brain, causing him pain. The good news: If that's what it is, then the steroids the doctor gave him should have him feeling better in a week. The bad news: If that's what it is, then continual steroid treatment should make him gain weight and/or a hunchback and the other treatments are experimental and invasive.

Allison, who has known she has HE for about two weeks now, presented with numbness, dizziness, and migraines. The symptoms are very different, so it is all so weird.

All that being said, Jake and I have safely traveled to Illinois tonight, where we will be spending the Thanksgiving Holiday with his family. All I have to say is I'm happy to be drinking Illinois water again, instead of that rare disease-inducing Tucson stuff.