Hey Guys & Gals! Speaking from experience, I was clear of Hep 'C' at the 6 month test. The VA considers me free of the disease. No one has said anything about donating blood or not. But I wouldn't anyway. My Hep 'C' first hit me in about 1981 while I was working at the Midland Nuclear Power Plant in Midland, MI. I got so bad that all it could do was sit and stare at the wall. I didn't have enough energy to even lift my finger. Back then there was no test for Hep 'C'. The doctors couldn't find anything wrong. So, they, basically, called me a lazy good for nothing, said it was a mental problem and told me to get back to work. Wow!! That was a really big help! I took a month off work, went to the health club every other day for a two to three hour workout and jogged a mile every morning. By the time the month was over and it was time to go back to work, I felt great. I continued the workouts spending almost every evening at the health club lifting weights, jogging, etc. And my health stayed good. I beat whatever it was that was making me feel so bad. Plus, I made idiots out of the doctors who had dismissed me as a 'good-for-nothing'. Then in 1992, while working at the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant in Avila Beach, CA, Hep 'C' hit me again. This time I noticed it when I went to the health club for my daily workout. One day I'd do the upper body and the next day I'd do the lower body workout. Normally, I'd begin my workout with a 5 minute ride on the stationary bike using a high tension. Then I'd do 20 extreme sit-ups on the 'Roman Chair'. After this I was ready to rock & roll with, either, the lower body or the upper body workout. However, suddenly I couldn't do that anymore. I had no energy. I'd do the bike and I was already cooked. This time the doctor found the problem. At this time in California, there was a test for Hep 'C'. The doctor did a liver biopsy and found that I had chronic cirrhosis of the liver. The prognosis was not good. People were dying from Hep 'C' and I knew and felt why that was. Zero energy!! Stare at the wall and don't move at all. So, I planned on dying. I took disability from work, began receiving Social Security Disability benefits and I went home to die. I was 47 years old. For the next 3 or 4 years I sat and I stared at the wall. But I hung around at my friend's car restoration business watching as he restored old cars. That kept my engineering mind busy. And it was okay for me to just sit. After, basically, resting for those 3 or 4 years, I began to have more energy. All this time I was still quite strong from lifting weights. I just didn't have the energy or the desire to do anything. Strength without energy is wasted. But because I was not forced to continue to work, not forced to be somewhere at a certain time each and every day and not forced to do things because a boss told me I had to do them, I rested. And I recovered enough energy to begin to have a sort of normal life again. However, I was very limited in how I could spend that energy. If I overdid things, I'd pay for it for the next week or so, until my liver could recuperate (I'd guess). Now, the Hep 'C' is not visible. But my energy level is still going down. This means that the liver is slowly deteriorating, even though the disease is pretty much enactive. I'm trying to lift weights again. I'm trying to jog again. But if I hit it too hard during the week by Friday I'm hurting and sick and have no energy. But by Monday, I've regained enough to begin self torture again. At the moment I'm recovering from an injury. I have to wait for the injury to heal. Then I'll go at it again. But this next time, I won't add weight too quickly. I have to realized that now I'm 67 years old. I ain't 20 no more.
But back to smoking pot... I sincerely believe that getting high off the right combination of pot ingredients would help me find more energy and more determination. It did it for me after I came home from Vietnam. I think it could do it for me again.
Better open a window.
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