Hi. I'm new to the forums. When I was 18 I was quite obese and diagnosed through blood test and ultrasound with what's called Fatty Liver disease. It is a silent benign disease that, in a small proportion of patients, can progress to Cirrhosis and eventually liver failure. The only treatment is to lose weight. I was told by my doctor to lose weight or there is a risk of this permanent liver damage.
That scared the bejesus out of my formerly-carefree mind and set off extreme anxiety. I did manage to lose 100 pounds over a year and a half or so. My blood work returned to normal and my doctor said I should be perfectly normal. Being a normal invincible college kid I went ahead and partied a bit in my last semester of college. I was normal, right?
In December 2009 I began to feel really scared and guilty about drinking after having been a liver patient before. One night I had an energy drink and with so much energy in me... I got a call from Dr. Google about cirrhosis symptoms out of the blue and had a massive panic attack and did not sleep for 2 nights from worry and it would have been 3 but I took some benadryl. I really do match a few symptoms of cirrhosis, although I don't appear physically ill.
I spent hours upon hours reading sites and forums and it just made me worry more. This is embarrassing, but to this day I do not look at my urine or number-twos, and I shower in the dark. I have a major problem with analyzing myself... I do it several times a minute. Almost been in auto accidents from my rear-view mirror. The stress is driving me mad and I am 21 years old.
Naturally I went to my doctor. Described my concerns and had blood and urine testing, both came back normal. They can't explain my symptoms NOR can they tell me for sure it's not cirrhosis. Only a biopsy can do that and "they have no reason to do one." That's hard to swallow when you face the chance at having a disease requiring transplant or death. My mom went thru kidney failure and transplant when I was young.
I don't have the money anyway ($1500?). What to do...
I want to just say "oh well" and forget about it but that almost feels like denial to me. Do you ever get that?
Thanks for reading.
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