(no subject)

Feeling a bit more positive this morning, after allowing myself a good wallow yesterday. I was only eighteen when I first fell ill with my tummy troubles. It took six months to get a sort of diagnosis, and twenty-three years on we still don't know exactly what's wrong with me. In my tender mind, visits to the doctor became linked not to hope and help, but to blind terror and disappointment. In those days, my panic anxiety disorder was in full blossom, undiagnosed and untreated. I was certain that I was going to die, either from the illness, or while under anaesthetic during hospital tests. So all those feelings came roaring up yesterday: helplessness, despair, fear, denial, resentment.

My adult self, however, has a lot of experience of illness and doctors, and has even had surgery under anaesthetic without shattering, dry-retching terror. Medical science has moved on a bit during the last two decades, too. Talking it through with Jon last night, and poking around on the Intersplat a bit, I realised that a visit to the gastroenterologist holds out the hope of a proper diagnosis, even a cure - and if not those, at least more information, better understanding, maybe better management of the condition. Heck, I'd be over the moon if I could just get Questran or some equivalent in the form of pills instead of this blasted powder which has to be mixed with water. Bring on the needles and tubes, doc, I'm ready!

This can't end well

Casino for asylum housing: "The Federal Government is involved in multimillion-dollar negotiations to use Christmas Island's luxurious casino resort in its battle to house the rapidly growing number of asylum seekers and staff required to care for them."

Missionaries providing lessons for Christmas Island detainees: "Evangelical missionaries whose stated aim is to bring 'non-Western' people to Christianity through such activities as English lessons are teaching asylum seekers at Christmas Island."