4 ms·

I'm reading into this, but I would hazard a guess that it appears he plays a lot of video games or surfs the web/blogs (he seems to have a lot to write about ga

by steven2012 12y ago

I'm reading into this, but I would hazard a guess that it appears he plays a lot of video games or surfs the web/blogs (he seems to have a lot to write about games, etc), and his roommates probably see this and react negatively to it, especially when he complains about being tired all the time. It's not normal for good people to act like jackasses, so it feels like there's something more to this story than just them not understanding that he has an illness. Out of curiosity, if there is no name for this illness he has, what sort of treatments does he do that require 2-3 trips to the hospital per week? Is he getting dialysis or blood transfusions?

peterevans 12y ago
You're kind of proving his point, aren't you? Your default assumption is that his roommates are probably right. What if he had crippling fibromyalgia? Or some horrendous cancer? > especially when he complains about being tired all the time He never said he complains all the time. He says he is tired; he did not say he complains that he is tired all the time. So why did you immediately conclude he must complain all the time? See, I read the point of the post as this: when you have a disease with no name -- no one can classify you as having a thing. You just have symptoms. I read his point as being that people sympathize with those who have a disease, but if you can't name your disease, it's almost as if you didn't have one. And hence his roommate who decided it'd be awesome to ride their exercise bike in his room as a form of punishment for not having a better sleep schedule. His roommate couldn't sympathize. Here's an exercise: you know how recent security exploits all have fun little names? And how those exploits have all gotten fairly extensive press mentions as a result? Do you think they would have had the same if they were left nameless, as most exploits in the past were?
- steven2012 12y ago
  Actually I didn't say his roommates were right, I said there may be an explanation for why they are behaving as they do, which is a misunderstanding of his situation based on the fact he possibly plays a lot of video games or surfs the web to blog, and yet says he doesn't have any energy to do anything. I never said he wasn't sick. But his roommates could misunderstand the nature of his illness, and hear him complaining about his condition, and then see him play video games while sitting in bed. This could easily explain why they don't believe him. He admitted himself that they are great people, and the fact they are behaving so strangely to him indicates to me that there is some other dynamic going on that we don't have an explanation for. The examples of the roommate taking an exercise bike into the room while he's sleeping is simply bizarre and toxic, if these people are as good as he says they are there must be some other explanation. There's always two sides to every story. Is he late with his rent because he doesn't have money, but always buys the latest video games? Is he playing games all night long because it doesn't take much energy, but does he not do his dishes because he's too physically tired? There's a lot of dynamics going on and we're getting a very 1 dimensional analysis of his roommates that he chalks up to them not believe he is sick.
  - JohnBooty 12y ago
    He admitted himself that they are great people, and the fact they are behaving so strangely to him indicates to me that there is some other dynamic going on that we don't have an explanation for. An obvious possible explanation is the fact that a lot of otherwise-good people have a hard time believing in illnesses they can't see. Ask anybody with an "invisible" malady and they'll tell you that some depressingly large percentage of the people they care about don't believe they're actually sick.
- anigbrowl 12y ago
  When he's complaining about a disease with no name, it might be worthwhile to provide a bit more medical background about the progress of his illness. Like many 'woe is me' stories on the internet, this left me with a lot more questions than answers and reading it ultimately proved to be a waste of my time. I feel sorry for the author but found his account of problems too incoherent to puzzle out, apart from the fact that he feels terrible and can only work about 30 hours in a good week. Maybe he needs to apply for disability and spend his limited uptime working on small-scale games rather than big commercial ones involving massive workloads and crunch time etc.
  - sp332 12y ago
    The post isn't about explaining his disease. That's just a little background info. It's not trying to defend being sick all the time, since that's really not something he should have to do. The post is just describing what it's like to be that sick all the time.
  - JohnBooty 12y ago
    Forest, not trees. There are probably a lot of people in your life who (like him) suffer from things you can't easily see. It's something we'd all do well to remember.
_xander 12y ago
I agree! In the same paragraph he goes from saying '[my roommate] once screamed at me, calling me “lazy”' to 'these people are, in most aspects of their lives, good people. Honestly, couldn't recommend them enough'. He also talks about suffering from fatigue so severe that he's 'too exhausted to sleep' and then explaining that he was able to: 'work part time, attend school full time, and do freelance writing...50 or 60 hour work weeks, effectively'. It's all a bit strange. I'm curious about HN's fascination with health posts - I've seen quite a lot pop up on the front page. Especially things about depression and unusual illness. (I hope the points/questions I've raised don't make me sound like a douche.)

peterevans 12y ago

You're kind of proving his point, aren't you? Your default assumption is that his roommates are probably right. What if he had crippling fibromyalgia? Or some horrendous cancer? > especially when he complains about being tired all the time He never said he complains all the time. He says he is tired; he did not say he complains that he is tired all the time. So why did you immediately conclude he must complain all the time? See, I read the point of the post as this: when you have a disease with no name -- no one can classify you as having a thing. You just have symptoms. I read his point as being that people sympathize with those who have a disease, but if you can't name your disease, it's almost as if you didn't have one. And hence his roommate who decided it'd be awesome to ride their exercise bike in his room as a form of punishment for not having a better sleep schedule. His roommate couldn't sympathize. Here's an exercise: you know how recent security exploits all have fun little names? And how those exploits have all gotten fairly extensive press mentions as a result? Do you think they would have had the same if they were left nameless, as most exploits in the past were?

steven2012 12y ago
Actually I didn't say his roommates were right, I said there may be an explanation for why they are behaving as they do, which is a misunderstanding of his situation based on the fact he possibly plays a lot of video games or surfs the web to blog, and yet says he doesn't have any energy to do anything. I never said he wasn't sick. But his roommates could misunderstand the nature of his illness, and hear him complaining about his condition, and then see him play video games while sitting in bed. This could easily explain why they don't believe him. He admitted himself that they are great people, and the fact they are behaving so strangely to him indicates to me that there is some other dynamic going on that we don't have an explanation for. The examples of the roommate taking an exercise bike into the room while he's sleeping is simply bizarre and toxic, if these people are as good as he says they are there must be some other explanation. There's always two sides to every story. Is he late with his rent because he doesn't have money, but always buys the latest video games? Is he playing games all night long because it doesn't take much energy, but does he not do his dishes because he's too physically tired? There's a lot of dynamics going on and we're getting a very 1 dimensional analysis of his roommates that he chalks up to them not believe he is sick.
- JohnBooty 12y ago
  He admitted himself that they are great people, and the fact they are behaving so strangely to him indicates to me that there is some other dynamic going on that we don't have an explanation for. An obvious possible explanation is the fact that a lot of otherwise-good people have a hard time believing in illnesses they can't see. Ask anybody with an "invisible" malady and they'll tell you that some depressingly large percentage of the people they care about don't believe they're actually sick.
anigbrowl 12y ago
When he's complaining about a disease with no name, it might be worthwhile to provide a bit more medical background about the progress of his illness. Like many 'woe is me' stories on the internet, this left me with a lot more questions than answers and reading it ultimately proved to be a waste of my time. I feel sorry for the author but found his account of problems too incoherent to puzzle out, apart from the fact that he feels terrible and can only work about 30 hours in a good week. Maybe he needs to apply for disability and spend his limited uptime working on small-scale games rather than big commercial ones involving massive workloads and crunch time etc.
- sp332 12y ago
  The post isn't about explaining his disease. That's just a little background info. It's not trying to defend being sick all the time, since that's really not something he should have to do. The post is just describing what it's like to be that sick all the time.
- JohnBooty 12y ago
  Forest, not trees. There are probably a lot of people in your life who (like him) suffer from things you can't easily see. It's something we'd all do well to remember.

_xander 12y ago

I agree! In the same paragraph he goes from saying '[my roommate] once screamed at me, calling me “lazy”' to 'these people are, in most aspects of their lives, good people. Honestly, couldn't recommend them enough'. He also talks about suffering from fatigue so severe that he's 'too exhausted to sleep' and then explaining that he was able to: 'work part time, attend school full time, and do freelance writing...50 or 60 hour work weeks, effectively'. It's all a bit strange. I'm curious about HN's fascination with health posts - I've seen quite a lot pop up on the front page. Especially things about depression and unusual illness. (I hope the points/questions I've raised don't make me sound like a douche.)