Episode 257 | Medical Aid Denials and a R34,000 Repair Bill: My Week in Review |

David Watts [00:00:00]:
Okay. Now that we've sorted out, the technical issues, it's, once again there. Hello. Welcome. What's involved? It is, it's the place where I talk about my challenges, things that are happening in my life, and autoimmune disease, etcetera, etcetera. Now I released an episode on Tuesday. Yes. Tuesday.

David Watts [00:00:32]:
And, I'm still trying to figure out how to get the what I believe the interesting part into sort of some some form of short so that you can you can get it. But, the long story short there is, that my little staffy shadow came to say good morning, and I was saying, come here, and maybe you want to, be on the channel, etcetera, etcetera. There was a cup of coffee next to my desk. You can see I haven't learned very much. And she then got all excited as staffies do and decided to jump up and say hi, and she smashed that cup of coffee and it went all over my laptop, all over the keyboard, all over everything. Camera fell over. I immediately sort of whilst all of this whilst recording, tipped it upside down and did my best to, you know, mop it up and dry it up. You'll be amazed where coffee can get.

David Watts [00:01:41]:
Anyway, as I was now then eventually cleaned everything up and trying to finish the podcast, what happened is the backlights on, my little MacBook, 1 by 1, they started to blink out. And, well, they just had caused a problem. So immediately on Tuesday, we brushed it off to the, Mac store, to the MacBook doctor, and we asked them, please just check that everything's okay. Write a diagnostic. Please tell me if it can be fixed and how much it's going to cost. And they said, we most certainly can, sir. We'll get back to you in the next couple of days. They did.

David Watts [00:02:34]:
And, the price tag was 34,000 to repair the coffee damage. So that was that that happened on Thursday. Something else happened. Can't quite remember what. Bear in mind my my polygym, 6 weekly sort of thing was supposed to happen on Monday Tuesday, and, that didn't. So I was feeling quite quite rough, but I decided to put on put on a brave face because I was talking about, you know, mindset and well-being, all of those things. And then Thursday comes, and, suddenly, we get a letter from the the medical aid because I'd had to go in on Monday to have the, the the the nerve conduction test. And a a letter came or an email came from, the the medical aid to say that the request had been denied.

David Watts [00:03:44]:
And I cannot tell you there was absolute panic, the feeling that you get. Okay? Because PolyGAM, if if anybody of you is on PolyGAM, it's, intravenous immunoglobulin, and it's I think it's white blood cells taken from many different people. I still don't understand the mechanism of how it actually works. It they pump it in, and I I guess your immune system gets all confused because there's lots of other bits of immune systems. And maybe it tries to fight that off, and it forgets about the CIDP and the the the myasthenia gravis. I don't know. Anyway, that's witchcraft to me. But I I went into a flatbed.

David Watts [00:04:34]:
Okay? Immediately, I was thinking, okay, so now what? What do we do? Because now the stuff that's supposed to be helping me, which the doctor has now, oh, that was the other thing she motivated. That's what made me upset as well. The, nerve conduction test came back as worse. So, instead of it stopping or going into remission after a year, It's getting it's getting worse. Okay? And I'm full with cramps and all sorts of other things. Forgot to put my phone on silent. How many years in radio have you been, David? Anyway, it's done now. And I then immediately went to bed because I was feeling good anyway, and decided I was going to have a small well, not a small, but a big pity party, big, big pity party because life sucked.

David Watts [00:05:31]:
I don't know what to do. I can't take cortisone, which is the other treatment because I have a hip problem. I sound like an absolute wreck, don't I? Anyway, Helena, who, if you don't know by now, is my angel, my saving grace, my warrior in both sense of the term, a worrier and a warrior, Immediately came flying downstairs to the office to talk to them, and it turns out that what they were doing, they were just being polite and letting us know that the application for the polyam that was supposed to happen on Monday, had been turned down, which I thought was nice, you know, a couple of days after turning us down, letting us know that it had been turned down. I mean, what would I have done in the interim? Anyway, so, the doctor has motivated for it to be once every 4 weeks, which is perhaps a good thing. I'm hoping it's a good thing. Maybe it's not such a good thing. I don't know, and that's that's why I'm doing this and I'm talking about this because I never in a 1000000 years thought I'd be in a in a position like this, talking about this, and I never realized that there were so many other people that are also experiencing these similar worse conditions. And when I went to go and look for a place to to talk to somebody other than my poor fiance, who I think I must drive insane sometimes because, you know, when she asked how I'm feeling, and I say, it feels like I'm dying slowly.

David Watts [00:07:17]:
It's not always positive. Couldn't find anybody. So I thought, let's let's let's start talking about this, and more for me than than any of the stuff I've done before where I've I've wanted to be well known and famous and a radio presenter and, you know, have a great blog about all sorts of fantastic things. This is this is kinda for me, it's a record. It's it's a record of of my journey and where it goes, how it goes, how I feel, what I'm doing. And I really want you guys to get involved with me, please, and and share it, you know, and and and talk about it and talk to me about it. Today's question, for example, is, you know, the obvious thing is a Facebook group. Would would that work? Would you sort of consider being a guest if you're in the medical profession, the alternative health profession, having a chat.

David Watts [00:08:20]:
Let's see let's see what what happens and, you know, even if we just, have some way to support each other, and and maybe, you know, the WhatsApp group is the way. Maybe there can be questions that you can ask on these videos. I can answer them. I can give you my thoughts. You can maybe give me your thoughts because trust me, and I don't know the figures, okay, but there's a lot of autoimmune diseases. And, me with my, OCD and everything, I seem to be trying to make a collection of them. So as you know, at the moment, CIDP, myasthenia gravis have been, that that have been diagnosed with that. But there there's at least one other that's that's playing hide and seek with with the doctors, so we got a list of them.

David Watts [00:09:14]:
But the weird thing is I was feeling so bad on Thursday. Here in South Africa, I watched the live election ballot counting. If you want to know something that will confuse the life out of, I believe, most people is what on earth is going on because I still can't understand that. No idea. Not a clue. But aside from that, it's it's like I said, it's Saturday morning. We're sitting here. Rest of the house is probably not awake yet because normal people sleep until around 7, 8, I guess, on the weekend.

David Watts [00:10:02]:
I got up at 5. For some reason, I'd ripped my CPAP mask off again in the middle of the night. And normally, I'm quite good about it. Normally, I just take it off like an absolute gentleman in my sleep and hang it up next to the bed. This was thrown on the floor, so who knows what happened there. But the question now remains, what am I gonna do today? How do I how do I feel today? And, to be honest, I've I've done my, my little meditation thing where I just try and sort of calm the mind and do all of those things. So that's done. Wanna try and do some writing because I think journaling is also another way of me remembering what's happening in my life and and all of those things.

David Watts [00:10:49]:
Maybe one day me or somebody could look back on it. But, what else do you do? When you when you feel like like, I don't know, death on toast? K. What do you do? What do you do to to kind of get through it? I know some people said to me, okay. Just think it's just for today, and tomorrow will be better. And that's easy to say, but it's not that easy to do. So as I said, right now, feeling okay, but I'm also feeling compelled to to say, okay, the the the reason I've told you the story is because I'm I'm human, and and I can't pretend it's it's alright all the time. But I also feel like I need to entertain you in some way. And I'm not sure which ways I need to to to entertain you in this Is there stories? There are stories.

David Watts [00:11:47]:
I'm sure I told you the one, where I'm getting these cramps. Happened again, last week where I was, emceeing a aquascaping, workshop, and I went to the bathroom. And as I went to turn the lock on the bathroom door, and, I'm a bit paranoid. I I like to be able to do things, you know, without somebody walking in. And in South Africa, and as that door is locked, somebody is walking in. And to make it worse, it was like a a a a what do you call I nearly said a a bisexual toilet, but it's not that. It's like Men and women, there's no there's no men's store, ladies store, so there's no way where you can go and find a a urinal, and you know that that's for the guys. So as I locked it, this entire side, which side of it, this side, I think, Shoulder all the way down here into the the the lat area went into an absolute muzzle muzzle.

David Watts [00:13:03]:
Oh, I can't pray now I've got the dumb a muscle cramp. So here I was in the bathroom determined to get some privacy, but my arm was locked like this. And when the pain happens, there's there's not a whole lot you can do. I mean, you can you can cry out, but I was in public. I refused to do that. Or you can quietly whimper in pain and see if you can't somehow work it out. Anyway, that that that took a while, to to get over. So those are the things.

David Watts [00:13:39]:
What else do I do that I find amusing afterwards? A lot of things, and I think humor is important. I think we've gotta try and find the humor in our situations. At the moment, one of them that I always, I find, quite amusing to myself is in the good old days, I I used to love a couple of drinks. I went through phases. There was gin and tonic. There was whiskey. Most recently, there's been frozen margaritas, but I've always loved tequila. You know, and then when you when you get when you get a bit bit smashed, you kind of tend to wobble a bit.

David Watts [00:14:26]:
I only have to drink now. I wobble. Okay? People think I day drink all the time. And, you know, that's that's quite interesting. Another interesting thing that happened is it made for me, and I also smiled about this, And I was turning to my friend, and I said, you know what? You sound so much better. You sound like you're doing so well, and everything is going well, and I'm like how can you tell by the way I sound? Just because I'm not going, my life is over. I'm in so much pain. How do you know that I'm I'm feeling better or not? Another thing that ame that amazes me is that people phone me or whatever or talk to me and go, how are you? And they go, actually, I'm quite cap.

David Watts [00:15:17]:
Thanks. That's fantastic, man. Yeah. Listen, I was doing this, that, and the next day. Have you ever figured out how many people listen to what you have to say? No. Because they're too busy thinking about what they wanna say, and that's not a bad thing. Well, it is a bad thing, but we're not gonna get into it in this particular instalment. So I've been thinking about what to do.

David Watts [00:15:42]:
Okay? How to do it? We've talked about this, those those extra streams of income and what can I do, And I've I've done some some meditation stuff, made the fatal error of trying to learn FL Studio? Right now, I would probably call it f off studio, but I'm gonna get there. And I wanna I wanna look at this because in in my mind, meditation, your body knows and it should know how to fix itself, and yet mine's confused for some reason. So how do we get ourselves to that place where we can activate our body's innate healing? Hence, the meditation for me in the morning, during the day. At night, I listen to to stuff, but, I want to do something specific for people that are suffering chronic pain. So I've done some of that. If you'd like to to get here's my sales pitch. For a limited time only, if you'd like to get yourself a copy of that, there are 2 that I've done, and, the one is just about, pain and healing pain, and the other one is about cellular healing. And I've used all the fancy bits and pieces.

David Watts [00:17:06]:
But, Adobe Audition apparently could only take me so far if I wanted to get all of those, you know, beautiful, etheric soundscapes. Air Force Studio was the way to go. So that's just that's just just me some more. But the point is, if you want it, drop me a comment, or you can send me an email. It's, david@watts, which is w a t t s involved, dot com. And, I'll happily I'll happily dropbox it or whatever the case may be, and, have a listen. Give me some feedback. Thinking of doing some more of that as a as a bit of a sideline.

David Watts [00:17:53]:
I want to try something arty, but I'm I'm about as as arty as a brick. So that's gonna be something. But I think for people that are that are living with these kind of conditions, we need to find some outlet so that we do not get consumed by the disease or diseases or the pain all the time because I find myself slipping into that. But sometimes the the just the pain, there goes the culprit. So there goes the 34,000 rand culprit walking out. That's shadow, by the way. And, spirul, off I go. Something to take our minds off the pain, something to focus on, because to me I mean, I think I finished Netflix twice now.

David Watts [00:18:52]:
And, you know, just laying in bed and you put something on the TV and stare at it, but if you ask me, what have I watched? 9 out of 10 times, couldn't tell you. So on that, rather depressing note, I'll try and find something funny in it, but I'd love to hear from you. Please like and subscribe. I do get better. Okay? And and, I mean, better in terms of positive thinking, better as in wellness, but better as in presentation. I mean, maybe one day, I'll be able to look like all those other slick fancy YouTubers that can do all of this fancy editing and have stuff pop up on the screen. And what you see with me is what you get. This is real, okay? Ain't no editing in this one, okay? Beginning, end.

David Watts [00:19:46]:
On that note, to each and every one of you, please, please, please, I think I'm at 668 subscribers already, which is absolutely amazing. But please like and subscribe. Please share with your mates, comment. Let's let's get involved. Let's talk about this stuff together. I would love to hear from you. I would love to hear what you have to say, because I think when you do this YouTube stuff, sometimes it can be fairly lonely. And I'm fortunate that I've got so many years of radio experience, so I'm used to talking to, a screen or a wall.

David Watts [00:20:25]:
But sometimes I think it can get lonely. So get involved. Let's have a chat. Let's see what we can do. You can also check out, my website, which is also www.watts, w a t t s, involved, that's all one word, whatsinvolved.com. And, yeah, you can drop me a voice note there. You leave comments. You can email.

David Watts [00:20:51]:
You can do all of those things. Join the mailing list. It's guaranteed to be full of stuff. Until next time. Take care of yourselves, and, be kind. Remember, we have no idea what somebody else is going through, and our world, in my opinion, has gone mad, and we've forgotten what it is to be human. So take a little bit more care, be a little nicer, and, have yourself a good one. Cheers.