Katelyn Maness

Adrienne Cassel Ph.D.

ENG 1201

December 3rd, 2019

Alternative Genre Project: Inner Monologue Representing Internal Conflict

Why do so many topics accompany the field of Rheumatology?

Why? Why I asked this pain, this disease, just why did I have to get you? I just don’t

understand how we were diagnosed with this Rheumatic disease, we were just four years old

when we got diagnosed. We didn’t know what was going on we had never even heard of a

rheumatic disease. It wasn’t until we were around the age of 12 when we fulling understood what

it was. While we were here with this disease as a child, people around us always stated I though

only older adults got these kinds of diseases, but I guess not. They don’t really understand how

much a disease can change you because it sneaks up on you and you land on your butt. We’ve

always been active and constantly on the go. We do sports, work out and run but our activity

level has started to decline. Our body hurts like it’s been hit by a truck, our knees and ankles are

swollen, and we’re just tired. We’ve gone to all the right doctors and were sent to a

rheumatologist. They put us through multiple diagnostic tests from blood work to x-ray scans,

and the results all came back the same. We’ve been diagnosed with a rheumatic disease and

we’ll need to start treatment as soon as possible. So Why? Why did you have to show up and

ruin my life? I just don’t understand why it had to be us. I make sure I’m eating the right foods
and have a balanced diet, exercise and stay active to keep our body healthy. So why did I get

you? Is it genetics or something environmental? These are the questions I ask you, my

rheumatic disease. But through all these questions we knew deep down I could do everything

right and still get you. It could be from genetics and environmental, maybe even both. But you

are just a new obstacle we will have to face each day. It might be hard somedays and others not

so bad, but I can do it. Those hard days when you are present with pain and swelling. Those days

when we must take medications that could make us sick with side effects, that could lead to more

medications, just to fight you from taking over, or progressing. But our first few treatments we

tried, methotrexate, arava, xeljanz, Actemra, and many more didn’t go well. We had to get three

knee surgeries, our gallbladder removed, and a cyst removed, that was caused by all the IV

infusion treatments. You even caused us to have our ankle fused because you took our cartilage

away between our two ankle bones. I had to wait a whole semester before having the surgery

because you had to happen right when we started college. Luckily, I’ve grown use to you, so it

didn’t really bother us unless we were walking up hill. Then the following year you had caused a

fatty tumor on our heart, and luckily, we didn’t need to have anything done, but you also caused

the heart syndrome POTS (postural ortho-tachycardia syndrome). Then the following year you

caused us to have a double TMJ joint replacement. Now that problem knocked us on our butt,

and it didn’t help that you caused us to get more food allergies at the same time. So for all of

those we needed some help from different doctors like our orthopedic, cardiologist,

pulmonologist, ophthalmologist, and many more because you don’t know how to take a chill pill,

literally since you also caused medication allergies and we now have to go a compounding lab to

get all our allergies out of some of our medications so we can function. So, I didn’t know

whether I should hate you, or not. But since I have had you since I could remember you became
apart of me, and because you, even though you still drive me crazy, I have become stronger,

caring, empathetic, and have gained tons of practice in the medical field for when we become a

Nurse. So when I first got you, we were at war with each other, but now while we are still at war

at times, we have become unlikely allies in our journey on the road called life.