Sorry if you shouted “HI!” to me on the street the other day while you were getting what looked like a yoga mat out of the back seat of your car and I didn’t immediately respond, and when I did it was only half-heartedly. I didn’t mean to be rude, but that afternoon I was recovering from GORD. You could probably tell – I mean, heck, we’re all familiar with the tell-tale signs of GORD, but in case you didn’t pick up on my ailment, that’s what was wrong with me.
To slightly complicate the matter I also had pancreatitis, a hernia, endometriosis, and kidney stones. On top of that, I had an ulcer (or possibly several, it was hard to tell in all the confusion), lactose intolerance, appendicitis, pelvic inflammatory disease and one of the more full-on cases of menstrual cramps I’ve ever had.
How did I have all of these things? Because I had a sore tummy, and when I went online to diagnose myself, these are the things the internet told me were wrong with me. I don’t think I’m overreacting because the website had pictures of doctors on it. I don’t know if you’ve ever decided to diagnose yourself online, but if you’re ever feeling like your day is going too well and you could do with some extreme pessimism/borderline doomsday hysteria in your life, these are the websites for you.
We live in an incredible age of medical technology where robots are able to perform microscopic surgery our clumsy stupid giant hands could never do, nanotechnology is able to scour our veins and scrape out nasties with the ease of a five year old picking his nose, and computer programs are able to hold more medical data on them than even my dad can pretend to know. However, none of that technology seems to have made it to self-diagnosis sites on the net, which basically consist of the following algorithm:
1. Do you hurt anywhere, inside or outside your body? If yes go to 2. If no, go to 3.
2. You will definitely die tonight.
3. Go to 2 anyway.
What may have seemed 98 percent like a scab with a bit of dirt in it when you jumped online 20 minutes ago is now almost for sure the start of the first of many sores you will develop as the bubonic plague takes over your body, gradually liquefying your organs as you implode into a horrific death. But at least you looked it up and have peace of mind now right?
I’m sure if you asked Google what the most searched-for terms were from people who had recently been on a medical-diagnosis site, it would be “low-cost funerals that still look classy” and “if I’ve had my neighbour’s drill for three years and I’m pretty sure he’s forgotten I have it, can I leave it to my kids?”
Oh, and the worst thing you can do is read the message boards! No one ever writes, “Thought it was Crohn’s disease, but just had gas. Ha ha. Silly me. Went to bed, next day found fifty bucks, good times.” All the stories basically follow the narrative of, “so after experiencing exactly the same pain you have at this instant, I decided to go to hospital even though I thought it was an overreaction. After I awoke from surgery the doctor said my colon was one second from exploding, and the pain I was feeling is known as The Certain Death Pangs, because everyone dies from it and it also pangs. May I remind you, it’s the exact pain you’re feeling right now that has brought you to this page. But it’s up to you if you want to go to hospital. See ya.”
I can’t tell you what I found out was actually wrong with me, due to medical privacy reasons, but I will tell you that I plan on launching a website soon named dontdrinkyoursmoothietoofastyouidiot.com.au to advice people against doing what I did. And then tell them they’re going to die, just so my website doesn’t feel left out.
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