Gambling on Life: I hope it's just Chloroquine toxicity

This post, like others that will follow it, is a continuation of my Gambling On Life series.

The very first medication to give me any sense of true relief from my severe RA is now - hopefully - the cause of some symptoms that have dramatically altered my quality of life in the wrong direction.

Let's talk about what is happening to me right now.

About 2 weeks ago I started having some constant severe numbness as well as pins & needles in my legs, hands and forearms, on top of various odd spots periodically throughout my body. Spots on my back, the back of my head, my neck, face, and nostrils would end up with a combination of numbness and pins and needles. These issues were amplified with heavy activity, or when I took my daily bath to relieve my general aches from my arthritis.

But wait, there's more!

I also started having cramping pains in various spots on my body; most prominent was my thigh on my right leg.

Oh, and my elevated heart rate that I had originally thought was post-COVID never went away, and seemed to - in fact - get worse. My heart rate when I'm sleeping is at best 90 BPM.

That's.. Not good.

It gets complicated to diagnose (read: Google) these issues when you've got so much wrong with your body. I focused on the numbness first, later adding the cramping. B12 deficiency is a possibility, as is more serious issues like MS.

I didn't think about the Chloroquine being a potential cause until 5 days later, where I randomly decided to look up potential side effects there. I've been on it for quite a while now, taking the maximum dose available.. And that's when I saw that Chloroquine toxicity covers literally all of my current issues beyond my Regularly Scheduled Broken Programming.

Shit.

The doc and I had talked about stopping the Chloroquine at some point, so I said "fuck it, let's stop taking it now."

You may be wondering why I didn't go to the ER or something. Right? Well, there's 2 very good reasons for that.

First off: The ER is going to run a lot of labs and - here's the big one - an MRI.

The last MRI I had at the ER cost over $7,000 USD.. WITHOUT contrast.

I just bought my GF a car because it didn't make sense to keep pumping thousands of dollars into her old one, so my savings is a little light. The last issue (brakes) was going to cost about $1,800 to fix, so we opted instead to scrap the POS.

Anyway, I'd deplete the rest of my savings and still not fully cover the cost of the MRI (and the deductible on my insurance is $6,800) if that was the route I went.

Fuck the American healthcare system (and Fuck Trump, who is documented at fucking hating disabled folks).

The second reason I didn't go to the ER is because I had an appointment with my rheumatologist in less than 2 weeks.

Well, I had that appointment earlier this week, and he agreed with my decision to stop the Chloroquine. He added a couple more labs to my regular shit, and if things don't improve in a couple weeks he's going to schedule more labs for me, and I've got a follow-up in a month rather than my usual 2 month appointments.

We've got a number of things to investigate before we get to the worst-case-diagnosis-method of an MRI, and I really fuckin' hope it's just Chloroquine toxicity.

Remember how I mentioned we got an estimate to fix my GF's car for the millionth time?

Yeah, why the FUCK can I get a free diagnosis of the issue and an estimate for repair without having to pay a dime on my GF's car, but the only way I can get even a HINT at how much it'd cost to just DIAGNOSE my health problems is having had one of the procedures in the past?

Seriously, we get nickled-and-dimed SO FUCKING HARD in the US to survive that it's a miracle more of us aren't dead.

Cancer and other diseases run rampant because folks have to worry about losing their damned homes just to get a diagnosis.

America's healthcare system is probably more toxic than the levels of Chloroquine in my body, and the fact that the US just said "hold my fuckin' beer" again with Trump is just.. Fuck.

America can't afford the healthcare it'll need to survive the stupidity it's running face-first into right now.