Things haven’t been going as easily with the insurance companies as I thought they would. Meanwhile, things aren’t going so well with my health. Last night was a particularly rough night. After trying my best to keep everything together, it kind of all came apart. There was a bit of crying, but mostly there were a lot of thoughts that were hoping to find a way out. They came out, in the form of a letter addressed to Dr. Cinco, the man who initially caused the bone infection in my left big toe that has led to ten years of complications and pain. I wrote that letter and published it on the blog last night. But then, afraid how it might be perceived, I took it down within a few hours. I didn’t think you all needed to hear how angry and upset I was.

    Then came tonight and spending eight hours in the Emergency Room due to some chest pain and my head tempting to repeat a horrific performance it gave on Saturday night when it hurt so badly I nearly threw up from the pain. I realized as I layed in the Emergency Room tonight that, you know what? If I feel so strongly as to babble madly to a man who will never hear what I have to say, I have the right to put it out there. Perhaps I should stop burying the babbling that has been brewing for a decade. Perhaps finally I should just let it all out there. I’ve tried to never ever write this blog with the readers in mind, only for myself, so as to protect it from being anything but a personal cathartic exercise. And what grander of an exercise could there be for me to confront an attacker who ten years ago lied to me and proceeded to harm me in a gruesome way?

    So I’m reposting the letter. The entry below is meant for him, but it’s also meant for the world to see, so that at least everyone else will know what he did to me and what I know he has done to other children who were under his care. Now this won’t just be my battle anymore, because I have the right to put it out there. And that’s exactly what I’m doing.

Dr Cinco,

    It’s been nearly ten years since we met. Next March will mark an entire decade since I had that simple ingrown toenail and I came to you, not for you to treat me, but to get a referral to see a Podiatrist who could treat me. You denied my request and instead set a chain of events in motion that has yet to be resolved.

    You lied to me, Dr. Cinco. You improperly anesthetized to remove a toenail I didn’t even want you to touch, you stabbed me in the bone with a needle you had contaminated with epidermal staph, and then you lied about it. You refused to treat me, you claimed nothing had gone as terribly wrong as it so obviously has. You lied, and in effect, you have ruined a life. Or at the very least, a decade of it.

    A person’s life is relatively short. You’ve stolen a very precious part of my life that I will never get back. You stole the last legs of my childhood. Worse, you’ve stolen years from my lifespan as my body continues to deteriorate before its time.

    You infected me, you took a vehement bacteria directly into my bone. You let it fester there for months before another doctor finally discovered the mess you left behind. I was eleven years old. By Christmas of that year, I’d had two operations and an IV line was sticking out of my chest, leaving me with a scar that still haunts me. There followed years of uncertainty as I fought with bizarre, unclassifiable symptoms. I never once felt fully human, looking at the scars on my body, constantly feeling inexplicably ill. Finally, when I was only fifteen, I got confirmation that what I had suspected was true. The infection you gave to me never went away. It continued to fester. I had another operation, another IV line, another set of scars. But it didn’t help.

    And then it spread. It started to eat away at my brain, causing me to forget how to move without falling over, how to swallow, how to speak. Finally, they had no choice but to disfigure my body further by taking away part of my foot. The very part of my foot that you brutalized ten years ago.

    I thought it was finally over. The last few years, things had been slowing down. I’d battled subsequent difficulties and complications, from ulcerative colitis to struggling to remember how to do simple math equations. I thought I was done, I thought I was finally coming out victorious after what you did to me. And best of all, I never once hated you. Not then. I hated what you did, but I never hated you.

    I hate you now. I hate you now in more ways than I have ever felt hatred in my life, and I will never be sorry for it. Because the complications didn’t end there, they haven’t, they’ve only come back worse than before. Now my immune system, being so truly exhausted from years of struggling, it’s eating away at me. This horrible new disease, it’s getting worse so much faster than before. I can’t sleep, my head aches so badly I want to throw up, my body hurts constantly without relief, and my heart is panicking. My body is growing so rapidly and there’s nothing I can do. If I don’t get treated soon, I’ll die from it. I’ll die because of you.

    The doctors knew that there would be complications, but they never prepared me for anything like this. I was supposed to have financial help, so that I wouldn’t have to face what I’m facing now with the insurance companies – an endless battle with inefficient, careless, faceless companies unwilling to pay to treat a disease they’ve never heard of and have no interest in learning about. I sued you to get the money to pay for this, so that should something arise, I would be taken care of after what you did to me.

    You smirked at me. As I sat on the stand in that courtroom, bawling as I described the intense pain of being stabbed without any anesthesia, you smirked at me from across the room. You heartless bastard. You lied and it seems you were proud of it. But worse, you got away with it. And now you’re screwing me yet again as I continue to face months and months that I don’t have arguing for my life with two health insurance companies that are supposed to be some of the best in the world. It’s your fault, you knew it, and you dared laugh at me, to my face. You cold, heartless bastard.

    As I sat crying for hours in the shower tonight, cold, shivering, and naked, I realized I don’t even know your full name. You’ve ruined my life, and I don’t even know your first name. So I can’t even track you down to deliver this mess of a letter. Does your wife know what kind of man she married? Do your children know who their father really is? Do they know you ruined my life? And do they know that you aren’t even sorry?

    I won’t ever forget what you did to me. And if I die from this, I swear that I will do everything I can to make sure that the rest of your eternity is as painful as you’ve made my life. I don’t usually believe in Hell, Dr. Cinco, but I believe there’s a special place reserved there especially for you. I have experienced pain no human should ever have to go through. I’ve watched my body decay before my eyes. My body is disfigured by hideous scars, my mind is riddled with memories I wish I could forget. And none of it would have happened if you hadn’t lied. Even if you had stabbed me and made that mistake, if you would have owned up to it like any kind of man or decent human being, I would have had a 99% chance of never even having an infection in the first place. I hope to God there’s such a thing as Karma, because that’s the only kind of justice I can hope for.

Sincerely,

    Me.