Causes and Cures

Sometimes I wonder what kind of direction my life may have taken if I believed a multitude of beliefs around the causes and cures of chronic diseases; inflammatory diseases.

I got sick at 14 years old.
What happened around that time?:
• Puberty
• Cell phones were more common
• Computers were everywhere now
• I babysat kids who got Beaver Fever
• I had been severely depressed shortly before becoming ill
• I had started seeing a psychologist
• I was badly bullied

At 17 years old, a diagnosed liver condition had mysteriously disappeared. Not gone into remission - was no longer there. It had been diagnosed with bloodwork, imaging, and biopsies. Then was gone.
What happened around that time?:
• My entire large intestine was removed with an emergency surgery, giving me an ileostomy
• I got my own cell phone
• I had stopped playing volleyball
• I was singing in a school musical
• I asked about getting a tattoo, and my doctor said I could only get one if I did not have a liver disease
• My brother had recently gotten married
• I was dating someone
• I had decided what I wanted to study in University
• I tried a restrictive diet to combat my Crohn's Disease - I was eating rice and chicken, that's it.
• I started new medication for Crohn's
• I was placed on antibiotics
• I got Mono

So - what cause should I settle on?
Can I blame bullying for creating a physical and chronic disease?
Can I blame technology? Is it because of radiation from computers and cell phones? Did I get exposed to Beaver Fever and my body freaked out?

Or is it just because my body has malfunctioned and began to fight its own organs and cells?

And how did a serious liver condition - Primary Sclerosing Cholangitis - suddenly disappear after positive tests? Lots of positive tests. So many that it couldn't be a 'false positive'.

Was I cured because I wanted to be cured to get a tattoo (which I never did get)?? Was it mind-over-matter? (But then why did my other illnesses stay??)
Was I cured because I finally got to have a sister when my brother got married?
Was it the diet change? Did I 'cure' myself by restricting my diet for a few years? Was it antibiotics that cured my illness?

Or was it something else - maybe another illness mimicking PSC? What if it was a misdiagnosis? What if I have these inflammatory autoimmune cells just floating around attacking every healthy organ it can? Or maybe the tests were ALL wrong....

But what do you think would have happened if I had claimed that 'having a boyfriend' cured my PSC? If I had gone public and was adamant that being in a relationship could cure severe diseases with no known cure, what kind of person might I have become.
Pedantic? Fanatical? Desperate?

What if I truly believed that eating rice and chicken cured my liver disease? Would I have kept that diet forever - even though there was no improvement in ANY OTHER disease I suffer from? What kind of title would I have given that fad? What kind of cook book could I have released - with all sorts of recipes for rice and chicken... so, like, a four page book? Lol. I had cut out sauces, spices, butter, milk, sugar, veggies, everything but boiled bland rice and boiled bland chicken.
Is that a 'curing' diet?

What if I believed that cell phone radiation cured me? What if I believed, unequivocally, that owning a cell phone could cure a multitude of diseases? What if I started a campaign to get every single person a cell phone?

What if I believed that getting Mono killed this liver disease? What if I felt that, by getting Mono, you could actually kill off inflammatory illnesses? Would I have advocated for everyone who is ill to try and get Mono, suffer for a few months, and then be CURED!? Not put into remission, but cured?
Would I have become one of those fanatical people who tell everyone that I was cured and that they can be as well if they listen to what I tell them to do?

In all honesty, I have two theories about the PSC.
I have a theory that I have such an inflammatory body, that there are cells that attack a different organ if they are driven out of another organ. For instance, by fighting the inflammation in my large colon, that inflammation moved to my liver. Then, when they disappeared from my liver, they went to my small intestine, pancreas, thyroid, and various other locations.
The other theory is that it actually isn't cured. That the disease is in remission and that it will rear its ugly head at some point in the future.

But the truth is, I have no idea. I am no expert. I am not a physician or even a researcher. I am a patient who knows her body, and I can guess and theorize, but I may never truly know.
But what if I did something random and believed it was the cause or the cure? Would I have become a misdirected advocate? I might have become an annoying, misguided, lecturer who said things like: "well of course you're sick! You are eating more than just rice and chicken!"... or "Well, of course you're ill. You're single! Until you open yourself up to a relationship, you will continue to get worse!"... or "Well if you had just gotten mono, you wouldn't be ill anymore."

Now do you understand how ridiculous some of those 'cures' seem?