Robert A. Hall
“Hi, I’m Bob and I have Pulmonary Fibrosis.”
“Hi, Bob!”
Sounds like a 12-step program. If only it had a success rate like one.
For background, I’m a Marine Veteran, having joined the Corps out of high school in ’64 and volunteered for Vietnam in ’66. Please note there are no Ex-Marines or Former Marines.
I was lucky in my timing and had an easy tour for a Jarhead, coming home in September of ’67, before Tet. I decided to get out of the Corps, go to college, get into politics and fix the world. I graduated from U-Mass with a BA in Government in June of ’72, and that November defeated an incumbent Democrat state senator in a Massachusetts district that last elected a Republican in 1938. I won by nine votes. I was re-elected four times by large margins, but got sick of politics and decided not to run for re-election in 1982. While a senator I earned a masters degree in history going nights, mostly for fun, and served an additional six years in the Marine Reserves. (That’s Staff Sergeant Hall to you, Private!)
Since leaving politics, I‘ve managed small non-profit associations, mostly in healthcare. At 46, I married my first wife, Bonnie. (She came to a Scottish Country Dance class I was teaching in Tallahassee, FL.) Through her, I have a granddaughter, Britnye, 9, who is the light of my life, which is a good thing, as we are supporting Britnye’s mother and her for reasons not worth boring you with. But I have to work as long as possible, so a debilitating disease is “non-sat” as we said in the Corps. They live in our condo in Madison, WI. Bonnie and I moved to the Chicago area for my current job two years ago.
I’m also a writer, having published hundreds of opinion columns and articles, many poems and short stories and a couple of books. Plus I maintain a political blog, so I get flooded with email.
On December 31, 2005, I started a bad cold, which went into my chest. I couldn’t shake the cough. This didn’t worry me too much, as I have a history going back at least to college of lingering coughs. My PCP ordered X-rays, and thought pneumonia. However, it failed to respond to two courses of antibiotics. Finally in June of ’06, I was referred to a pulmonologist, who ran a CT scan and breathing test.
The diagnosis was “early interstitial fibrosis.” That got my attention, as my mother died from Pulmonary Fibrosis in 1995, at 69, less than six months after being diagnosed. We were told it was probably from a childhood disease she had. I’ve since learned there is a hereditary, probably genetic component to PF.
The Pulmonologist said that he didn’t think I was at high risk of developing PF, but that I wasn’t at average risk either. He suggested certain things, which I followed. My yearly CT scan showed it was stable. There were two nodules he was also watching, but one went away and the other hasn’t grown. So basically I lived with the bad cough on a daily basis. It’s a productive cough, unlike most folks with PF, probably due to my allergies and sinusitis. (I’m allergic to red oak, pollen, ragweed, cockroaches and dust mites, but not cats. So my wife got to keep her pets, I had to get rid of mine.) I was stable enough that we bought a second-floor, no-elevator condo in June of ’09, tempting fate.
Then in October of 09, I went to Colorado Springs on business. The scenery was lovely, but the altitude knocked me for a loop. I was badly short of breath (SOB) and the cough got worse.
Steroids brought the cough down, but it went back up. In January of 2010, the doctor did a bronchoscopy, which confirmed that I had Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis and it had gotten worse. The question now is will it stabilize at this point for a period, or continue to deteriorate.
I never smoked cigarettes, but I did smoke a pipe from time to time, though like Bill Clinton I didn’t inhale. In the Marines and politics, I’ve been exposed to enough second-hand smoke to give Smokey the Bear a psychosis. The senator who sat next to me always had a cigarette going, which I think is why she is no longer with us.
As I write, I’m far luckier than most people with this disease. So far, I’m still working full time, and am not on oxygen yet, though I anticipate that coming. The leadership of the surgeons’ association I manage has been supportive. I’ve lived longer and, having won the lottery of birth—born in America—better than 98% of the people who have ever lived. So I have no real complaint coming, but I’m shooting for 99%! ~Bob
“Risk more than others think is safe. Care more than others think is wise. Dream more than others think is practical. Expect more than others think is possible.” –Claude Thomas Bissell
