At least I stayed away from the message boards

I imagine it’s pretty tough to be a doctor these days. What with WebMD and www.mayoclinic.com and Google, it’s pretty easy for the average shmoe who isn’t feeling well to become a medical expert in one sleepless night…at least according to the shmoe. I was one such shmoette a few days ago as I sat across from my doctor, ready to tell him how I was going to ignore his advice.

It started back in February-ish when I started having this annoying leg pain. Really annoying. And really scary since leg pain once resulted in a back surgery. So I tried to ignore it, then deemed the gym and then the treadmill the culprit, then bought new walking shoes, changed my walking path, avoided hills, saw my acu-hippie a lot more, exhausted my medicine cabinet’s array of options, applied heat and cold and zappy electrical currents, and after three months of undeniable annoyance, finally went to my doctor dreading a sciaticy diagnosis or at least an MRI script.

Instead, I was relieved to find out it was not sciatic and instead probably a hamstring issue. I was given permission to take a lot more Aleve and Rob was instructed how to help me with stretches twice daily. Honestly, it was a pleasant way to start and end each day, lying on the floor with a leg on Rob’s shoulder as we discussed the day ahead or behind. It slowly seemed to help and I was optimistic about taking our New England cruise without the leg pain. Well, denial kicked in by the time we got to Halifax and I enjoyed the trip immensely, recurring leg pain be damned.

After we returned from our trip, my leg was still hurting and I was tired of it getting in my way. A friend shared she was having leg pain, too, which she had just found out was caused by a bulging disc. Fantastic. My imagination and fear started their predictable spins out of control. The night before I was going to call my doctor to request an MRI, I happened to read a brief article in Consumer Reports about cholesterol medications. There in the middle of the article was this light bulb of a sentence: "With all their benefits, statins have downsides that should be considered. Five to 10 percent of users experience mild to severe muscle pain and weakness.” AH-HA!

Quickly reviewing the timeline, I’m pretty sure I gasped when I realized my leg pain, my really annoying leg pain of nearly 5 months, had started within a month after I began taking a statin for my modestly high LDL. That night I skipped my pill and wondered if I would notice a difference. Four days later, I walked up a mile-long trail to the top of a 600ft waterfall…without leg pain. A week prior, I was having to pep talk myself into walking up the 300ft-long, 25ish degree incline during my otherwise flat walk in the park. And so the alternatives-to-statins research began.

I can now tell you…and my very patient doctor…all sorts of things about statins and Coenzyme Q10 and niacin and fish oil and red yeast rice and CRP tests. I have now memorized my pre-statin cholesterol numbers and know that my happy cholesterol (HappyDL) is sky-rocket high (thank you, red wine!) and my triglycerides are fine and that my lousy cholesterol (LousyDL) is 11 points higher than the “borderline high” line drawn in the sand by someone at some time who claimed to know these things. I also know that there is a LOT of controversy and differing opinions and heated debate about the actual importance of all this gibberish and whether it’s worth treating, let alone how.

And so, armed with the ability to quote a 2007 University of Pennsylvania study showing a positive impact of this red yeast rice stuff on lowering cholesterol, I chatted for a good 20 minutes with my doc about why I was not taking his statiny medication anymore. I was respectful and polite, as was he. But he made it clear he was skeptical of the 2007 study (he was familiar with it…no doubt from lots of other shmoes) and would prefer that instead of playing with yeast, we played with finding me a more tolerable statin. It was a very honest and candid conversation. I expressed my intense reluctance to sign-up for any additional daily pain. He shared his personal distress of not being able to tolerate any statins himself and therefore living with the knowledge that his cholesterol is high and getting higher and there is nothing he can do about it. He said, “Well, if this were 1950 or 60, I would just tell you what to do and you would do it. But things are different these days and I can only make suggestions.”

And in that moment, still determined to abandon statins forever and give the unregulated, non-FDA-approved yeast a whirl, I realized the frustration that today’s medical professionals must feel. How disheartening it must be when their years of schooling and training and experience are considered on par with Google searches done by their shmoey patients. But, my health is my health and my pain is my pain and my decisions are mine to live with.

In the end, I consider my doctor a partner, so we compromised with a plan for me to yeast and chia seed and oatmeal and flavonoid my heart out over the next four months and then test again. If things haven’t changed in the right direction, I will work with my partner to find a more tolerable statin…Goolging all the way.