Working with Fear

These lines in my accident log from yesterday give rise to fear:

20:40:03
flutter in left upper arm.

20:42:38
flutter in left upper arm.

20:48:41
flutter in left upper arm.

20:58:46
flutter in left upper arm.

21:04:58
flutter in left upper arm.

21:05:47
flutter in left upper arm.

21:09:12
flutter in left upper arm.

21:16:46
flutter in left upper arm.

21:31:06
flutter in left upper arm.

21:32:33
flutter in left upper arm.

21:34:28
flutter in left upper arm.

21:34:53
flutter in left upper arm.

21:40:47
flutter in left upper arm.
plus pain in left thigh

That is fourteen events in the space of one hour.

On waking this morning at 0530 I noted further flutters in the same location. Whatever this is, it is rapidly progressing.

When I saw Dr D on Thursday, and we discussed the ALS / CTE issue, she said I appeared frightened. My years of service in marine search and rescue have taught me to acknowledge fear but not to give in to it, or to allow fear to overcome rational thought and thereby inhibit an appropriate response. In search and rescue to be overcome by fear was the route to certain injury. Or worse.

As of this month I have been 22 months on a gouvernment de Québec wait list for a family physician. I have been engaged for 16 months with insurance company in the attempt to prosecute my injury claim. Absent medical expertise to define the injury, I am unable to advance a successful claim. The gouvernment de Québec denies me medical services and this failure then permits the denial of my insurance claim. I am sure this action saves the gouvernment de Québec considerable money which it can then use to hire language police and fine Italian restaurateurs for daring to publicly advertise the fact that they sell pasta.

If Wikipedia is accurate, then I am subject to a progressive neurological disease that will lead to a painful, and very unpleasant, death within three to five years.

And while I acknowledge the fear, I try not to give in to it.