help morgan pay for surgery for chronic infection
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I have to get surgery for chronic infections in my jaw again. The total cost for treatment comes out to $19,163 but i put the gofundme at 21000 to adjust for fees that gofundme takes from donations. i would say it’s embarrassing to have to air all my personal medical history all over again for the entire world to see but i dont really give a shit anymore. i just want to survive.
the shortened version of this is that i have chronic jaw infection/holes in my jawbone that i will need surgery on again. i have CIRS (chronic inflammatory response syndrome) from confirmed mold mycotoxin exposure as well as exposure to heavy metals, fibromyalgia, Chronic EBV from cirs/mold affecting my immune system, and have lyme disease antibodies, which has allowed this infection to thrive. im currently working on treating this with a doctor, but an essential part of healing is getting this surgery again because it's putting a massive stress on my body. This time with surgery what i will do that i didn't do before is i will be getting bone grafting to establish stronger bones to protect healing and a more comprehensive treatment plan with both my dentist and doctor with the improved chances that it doesn’t return again. No dentist that performs this surgery accepts insurance from what i’ve checked. rather they submit bill to your insurance for reimbursement. the whole thing is stupid because who has 20000 dollars just lying around
the rest of this may be boring and is mainly me getting into how annoying my life has been the past year or so dealing with this but for those curious or invested as to why i harbor bizarre illnesses that u typically only see from people that work in cobalt mines 16 hours a day around january of last year i experienced a whirlwind of bizarre symptoms, where i lost partial sensation/feeling and couldnt feel cold things nearly as much as i had before. months prior to this i also had a building pressure that started on my jaw and began spreading down my neck into my shoulder area and my chest above my heart. i experienced massive systemic issues when i started experiencing weird nerve-like issues - i could feel my whole body pulsating, debilitating chronic fatigue, digestive issues, sore and painful muscles, chronic sore throat, chronic tension headache, i could see the veins in my hands start pulsating, heart palpitations, sinuses became swollen, chronic pain in lymph nodes, heat/hormone regulation issues, brain fog, etc. i bewildered doctors and specialists, have been to the hospital and ER countess times when new worsening symptoms developing, was passed around by countess dentists and doctors all saying, nope we cant find anything. you look fine to me, go home. so i kept searching.
someone pointed me in the direction of the pressure along my neck being “jaw cavitations”. i read up on them online, every peer reviewed article and post on it imaginable and other experiences from people who have had to get this surgery. seeing that they were only performed by biological dentists outside conventional practice, the surgery is only performed by handfuls of specialists around the US. but it has been increasing in popularity, even though some dentists in the field deny their existence, or dont even know about them, as some dentists i went to did.
i can only speak to my personal experience when i say that for me the symptom manifestation of this infection and the way i feel it moving in my body is not merely a psychosomatic phenomenon (although im sure that stress can aggravate and cause health issues sure) and i can attest to this from having gotten surgery for it and a confirmed CT scan diagnosis, as well as my symptoms matching up with other patients who have been diagnosed with this infection.
anyways last april i did a gofundme (thank you to everyone who donated! because of you you bought me time to figure out what is wrong with me and helped me initally get this surgery) to help pay for medical bills and fly out to texas for jaw surgery. i had 3 confirmed infected sites, all where my wisdom teeth were. after getting the surgery i immediately felt a lot of stiffness in my body go away: i also felt the pressure that had been building for months starting in my jawbone completely disappeared. i also wasn’t nearly as constantly dehydrated as i once had been. but i still had many underlying symptoms unresolved. the dentists told me that i frankly was in worse condition than 99% of their patients and that i should see a functional medicine doctor to figure out what else is wrong with me. they said they see patients from all over the world and typically they usually always have something else going on with them causing the problem.
I flew back a couple days after my surgery and saw a functional medicine doctor who did lab testing and got me diagnosed with mold toxicity/cirs and chronic ebv. chronic ebv is relatively rare and offers poor prognosis, with majority of adults diagnosed dying within 5 years, the average being around 2 years. it however is curable, but the main way to cure it is to address the underlying cause of why my immune system is suppressed and why this is being allowed to happen. I tested dangerously high for ochratoxin A through a urine test, a mycotoxin found in water damaged buildings. mycotoxins are apparently powerful immune suppressants, so i left my musty smelling house and stayed with my mom for some months before moving to new york. things were getting better.
Moving to new york for grad school i slowly felt a worsening of symptoms again, more painful lymph nodes, worsening headache, worsening hormones, worsening brain fog, feeling myself making many more spelling mistakes, more dehydrated, and my pressure on my jaw was back and spreading down my neck again slowly like it had been before. still, ive been doing my best to live life, have fun, while working on my mfa and trying to address health issues.
I’m currently moving this month out of my apartment, throwing away and selling a lot of stuff that i cant take with me, as i did a test for mold in my apartment and found significantly high amounts of various types correlated with water damage. I also believe my school is causing a problem as well so im buying a respirator and working on getting approved for disability accommodations.
I’m 27 years old and i have tried so hard to get better. at some times i believe that i have - i can work out now and dont feel as winded from walking as i did before, ive worked with a therapist this past summer who gave me the tools to deal with problems and help me look at life through a different lens. I can go out and do things, be more active. But now my jaw infection has spread down past my chest and I'm experiencing worsening heart symptoms. I've read about there being a high correlation with these jaw cavitations to cancer, especially breast cancer. My digestion has worsened significantly now. There is an alarm bell ringing in my head telling me “you gotta get this fixed soon”. no more putting things off. I’m running against the clock and i need things to start getting better, not worse.
This is all to say i’m moving out of my current apartment and working with a doctor that treats this condition. I recently got on a low-amylose diet and cut most dairy, all gluten, grains, sugar, starches, alcohol, and coffee. Ive found this to be necessary in fighting against worsening symptoms. Now im currently trying to scramble funds to get surgery for this co-infection of my jaw to help give me a fighting chance. All i can ask is for your help. Thank you.
Organizer
Morgan Patten
Organizer
New York, NY