News from the rice paddies

[Peter Hendricks]

First, a message for our friends in Germany:

Ich bin vom 6.8.bis 9.9. in KH. Wer sich mit mir treffen will, einfach eine Email schreiben. Su ist dieses Jahr nicht dabei; weiteres dazu im Folgenden.

Dear friends,

So I was thinking that we would be making plans for our trip to Germany now. Unfortunately, Su got very sick and she can not make this long trip. So I will be travelling alone this time.

It all started a few months ago when she dropped something heavy on her foot. Of course it swelled up and was painful to walk on. Instead of it getting better, the toe next to it also swelled and became painful. Around the same time we noticed some spots appearing on her belly and back and we thought, horror of horrors, the psoriasis was making a comeback. Things went downhill from there, with hip and knee joints on the other side becoming painful and she was getting periods of fever, but only in the afternoons and evenings. The spots started to spread. For a few days the joints became so painful, she needed help to get out of bed and a wheelchair to move around. Eventually I was able to drag her into a clinic. The doc took an xray of the foot, but there wasn't much to see, so he gave her anti-inflammatory drugs and painkillers. He diagnosed the spots not as psoriasis, but a fungus infection.

Time passed, but things didn't really improve. The spots were now spreading over all her body, covering about half of her torso's surface. Visit to a clinic in Suphanburi, where she saw an orthopaedic surgeon. He looked at the xray we brought along, could not see anything there, took a quick look at the foot, didn't touch Su or examined her in any way, had a long conversation with her and sent us on our way with more drugs.

More time passed and still no improvement, so we made the trip to see the paediatrician who had successfully treated Su before, a trip of 200km each way. He took one look at the xray and told her she had a broken toe. (You have to wonder about the orthopedic surgeon...) He took another xray and the toe is ok now.

An allergy test then showed that the rashes are due to multiple food allergies. It turns out that Su is allergic to a very large number of food stuffs, including such staples as rice, potatoes and bananas. She now has to eat a strict diet and hopefully this will make her rashes disappear.

Now, to conclude this on a brighter note, here is a link to more pictures and stories from the last 8 months:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/bW2aCLzQdtBXN8kW8

There are 2 "links" to very short videos of a couple of visitors in the picture comments, but these are not clickable (thanks, Google). If you can't deal with them, here they are again:

https://vimeo.com/831168088?share=copy

https://vimeo.com/848678647?share=copy

I hope to meet many of you soon. All the best,

Peter & Su.

[Dennis]

Many thanks Peter ,

I am about to fly to Taupo for a family function. Will get a proper reply under way after that.

Things not good healthwise.

Best wishes to Su.

D.B.

Get Outlook for Android