Pensive - Pensieve

In high school, I remember emerging from intense sport seasons and having FREE time after months of school, practice, meet, dinner, homework, sleep. repeat. I would suddenly start thinking again, having random and creative thoughts. Only then would I realize how busy I had been.

Anyway, I guess I have been less busy (and/or there is no good television on...) and I've been inspired by a few things.

In my research on Epstein-Barr, and many accompanying fatigue illnesses (Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, thyroid problems, etc.) I got really interested in the subjectivity of illness. The ability of the mind to articulate its state is limited. When we do express our illness, it lives in the context of our understanding of how illness works and the notions of the society around us. What is "well"? What is "sick"?

Take the state of "blackout drunk," for example. This state is particularly complicated because it pulls in ideas of memory, and also self-presentation. If I go in and out, but have moments where I don't remember what happened, is that blackout? What if I remember when someone reminds me? Perhaps there is one extreme that everyone agrees on, but the point is that we don't live in extremes, but the moment someone puts their behavior into a yes/no category they are assigning qualities to their behavior that may or may not have actually occurred. Furthermore, people have plenty of motivation to underplay or highlight their state of drunkeness, making reporting of this information even less reliable. "I was soo blackout" is such a cliche - an excuse for bad behavior, a way to show off. Denial of a blackout state comes with its own line of reasoning. So it seems if I were to order these things:
1) Sensory experience
2)Interpretation of experience: Where does my experience fit within the categories/experiences I know? Do I want to exaggerate/deny my state for any reason?
3) Articulation of experience
4) Understanding of experience by others and self - symptoms change based on categorization and feedback. i.e. "not that bad" for a blackout. Experience can be validated/negated by peers

Anyway. I decided I want to learn more about societal understanding of illness. Epidemiology was one of my surprise favorite classes (I wrote my final paper on childhood obesity and it was sooo much fun! and proffy liked it!). I had read a little bit about medical anthropology in some random course packets ( parts of Emily Martin's Flexible Bodies and Susan Sontag's AIDS and its Metaphors) so I checked them out of the NY Public Library and started a skim through.

Martin's work will be the most interesting, I think. I already looked through all the pictures :). Without having read more than the abstract/intro and the random chapter I read a few years ago, it seems her idea is that we used to think of immunity as castle/fortress model, with the body as a closed space with open orifices that germs could pass through and must be defended. As we understand the body through new technology and new cultural ideas about "flexibility" these exterior and interior changes emphasize immunity in terms of flexibility. Right now I haven't seen enough examples to make the word "flexibility" resonate in my mind but I'm curious to read more.

Right now, I personally have been very interested in the role of viruses. Traditionally, I think of viruses as infecting, and then leaving. Now, I think of them as being able to permanently alter mental states (lyme disease, that disease you get from cats) and physical states (rheumatic fever, chronic fatigue syndrome, EPV, that virus that makes you obese).

I also never thought of viruses as an environmental factor. EPV and HPV cause cancer, something I associate with too much sun (skin cancer) or not eating a healthy diet (colon cancer). Viruses can also be catalysts for people with genetic predispositions to certain illnesses, initiating Multiple Sclerosis and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Crazy! Viruses are not just COLDS. I feel I have changed my perception so much since that day in biology we had to write a two-sided persuasive on whether or not viruses were alive. Back then, the idea that something not an organism could infect you was something we were conditioned to feel was novel, the same way a prion (what causes Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy aka Mad Cow Disease) causing a disease seemed crazy, since a prion is just a protein.

All of these ideas about viruses freak me out and make me feel like I have no control - so the view that emerges from that for me is that there is no "one size fits all" way to defend the body against contagion - everyone has different weaknesses in their castle wall, so to speak, and every body has soldiers that are quick to recognize one attack and oblivious to another. Moreover, attacks can change immune structure and response, causing even more unpredictability with regards to response. So there's really nothing you can do but feed your little soldiers and keep healthy and not worry too much about it.

...and let me take back what I just said: I also find autoimmunity absolutely fascinating, especially because scientists have founds ways to manipulate the body's immune response in the case of certain allergies, such as peanut allergies. This is where I get really excited about the other book I just read, The Dirt on Clean, which talked about how these opposites
healthy vs. sick
dirty vs. clean
moral vs. immoral

have at times been aligned in every single configuration. Dirt used to be seen as protective; cleanliness a sign of moral suspicion. The polio epidemic, in fact, was so bad in the 1950s because people were too damn clean. The disease is passed by fecal-oral contamination, so sanitation had progressed to the point that everyone was too clean to be adequately exposed as a child, but not clean enough that they would never ever be exposed to that disease. Similarly, many children on farms do not have allergies, so many dust/seasonal allergies are associated with environments that are too clean and give the immune system nothing to do, making it over-react to benign substances. Thus, recently, the idea of dirt as 'exercise' for the immune system, enabling it to learn to react appropriately, has been repopularized. So fascinating!

Anyway, enough about diseases, time to go off and have some Saturday night fun.
(Although I must admit, I am quite tired, and have been all day. Is it me? Is it the Epstein-Barr? What would my lab results say? If they said I was well would I still be 'sick'?)

La De Da Dee

Last weekend was underwhelming - a date on Friday night with a mere glass of wine, and then more wine on Saturday with Jess and her work friend LeeAnn (we talked about making homemade granola! I tried this week but kinda sorta burned it but then ate it anyway..) but not mustering up the energy to leave the apt.

Anyway, I did have a good time at the show, which took place at Mercury Lounge and featured Mahogany as an open, which played poppy, fun music. They're based in Brookyln so I'm sure I'll hear them again. The main act was Dirty on Purpose. The highlight of the show was the wasted guitarist, George. He was very cute, especially when he presented the bottle of Jack Daniels with a plastic nipple on the rim to the band member celebrating his birthday. Not so cute when he basically disappeared, because he was sitting on the floor playing his guitar and stumbling around wasted, and drinking whiskey like I drink water after a long run. At one point someone in the audience tried to feed him a hot dog and/or a piece of cake. His band members were like "What is that!? He has a nut allergy. Are there nuts in that?" Funny juxtaposition of the rock star lifestyle and reality.

This week I haven't done much - I've been feeling under the weather so I've been sitting in the recliner chair with my blue puffy down blanket and watching loads of TV, and feeling like a huge couch potato when my roommates return home after exciting evenings. In my fitful sleep, I was awakened to one roommmate coming home at 2am two nights ago. The life. Instead I've been sleeping for ten hours. Yesterday morning I pressed my snooze button and had a seven minute dream about taking a shower before my alarm went off again and I realized I still had to take my shower. I hate this level of sickness - where you're not that sick but feel compelled to 'take it easy' lest you delve into a deep sickness and inability to do anything.

Yeasayer and Man Man are tonight, at Brooklyn Masonic Hall. I'm nervous to go out in Brooklyn...