It could be that our bodies are built much better than your car ...

I''d reckon that a checkup every 20 or so months is quite enough. You still ain''t that old Guru.

Damn you Spunior and your harsh realities!

Look guys, speaking from experience, get your asses over to the doctor.

I''m 32, and I just found out, after a 3-4 year lapse in going to the doctor that I have something like 200+ cholesterol, and 350+ triglycerides, basically off the chart as far as heart attack precusors go.

Maybe I''ve added 10-15 (or more) years on my life by attacking this now, before I end up in the emergency room.

Knowledge is power.

I''m on meds that need to be refilled every year, so I always get the basics checked out. Then again, things usually happen to me that I end up going in anyway.

Yeah, checkups are a good thing. I don''t speak from the same experience that mateo does but I''ll add something in.

My mother hadn''t had a checkup for about two years before she went in a few months ago. In one fell swoop they found the dreaded ""Lump"" and found out that she was in the early stages of Diabetes.

The lump was, happily, pre-emptively removed and she''s on a completely new diet to deal with the Diabetes. But finding all that out in one fell swoop is a wake-up call, if anything.

Remember, knowing is half the battle.

In some cases you will, in some cases you probably won''t. It depends on the type of cancer and, of course, the part of the body that is affected. A carcinoma that has the size of a marble or bigger isn''t something that pops up within one day, it''s growing slowly (weeks and months) and therefore the change happening within your body may not be that notable. And if has affected something like the colon region one probably wouldn''t notice it too soon since it''s not like some knot you could feel.

I''d like to elaborate some more but my English is hitting its limits a lot faster in the case of medical terms and the like.

I am the only one here who isn''t old? With exception to baggachiz for course.

X-Raying is still better than nothing at all. Physical checkup doesn''t necessarily mean that you''re going to get a camera shoved in.

Question: have you ever gone through chemo or lived with someone who had to? It''s a physically incredibly exhausting process. It''s more than swallowing some pills and losing one''s hair. Sometimes you''ll feel like crap all through the day, and often you won''t have enough condition for any activity that takes longer than 30 minutes. (And I''m not even talking about sports here.) And that''s just two of the side effects.

Apart from being physically exhausting, it also is psychology exhausting. Not only for you, probably even more so for your family and friends.

Vector, how old are you? I''m pretty sure Pyro, Ulairi and I are all around 22-24.

My attempt at satire doesn''t seem as amusing in the light of day as it did late last night. I do understand the ramifications of chemotherapy, but thank you for the recap.

Actually, the doc I talked to at the clinic seemed fine (and what I had wasn''t mysterious or earth-shattering). It''s not that I don''t like doctors, or even have a particularly bad opinion of them. It''s more a general distaste for the way many people seem to view modern medicine. It''s like people aren''t allowed to have problems any more - at the first sign of a possible something wrong, it''s off to the doctor to get a prescription. I realize that not everybody (not even most people) are like this, but there are enough of them that I actively don''t want to emulate them, to the point of probably not seeing doctors when I should.

Add to that the fact that there are medicines and procedures out there for things that (in my mind) don''t even need to exist - 180 different brands of medicated face cleanser, the Atkins diet, and don''t even get me started on liposuction - and I''m left with an overall desire to stay away from medicine as a whole unless I''m seriously non-functional. Kinda like at Cub Camp, where the outhouses were nasty enough that we all just went for a week without using ''em.

Wow, I''m only 27 but several of you guys make me feel old.

*edit* no, wait... 26? Gah; I hate calculating my age. Yeah, 26, I turn 27 this year.

...what? don''t look at me like that, I typically don''t care enough about age to even remember my own. I wouldn''t even remember my girlfriend''s if she hadn''t just gone through the ""turning 30"" crisis last year. I didn''t see what the big deal was; heck, she could pass for 25 if she wanted, and again, age isn''t that big a deal unless someone''s not legal.

Bunch of young pups, aren''t ya?

Get yourself to the doc anyway. Might save yourself some trouble in the long run.

Man. This string gives me a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach, which I can now imagine decaying as I sit here.
I''m trying to find a new primary care phys. after being unemployed for more than a year and a half.
I called numbers from the list supplied with my new health care, but have been having a hard time finding a doc taking on new patients.
I was speaking with the receptionist, nice lady, for one doctor. She took some of my information, then stopped and asked me, ""You DO know this is an OB/GYN office, right?""
""Well,"" I said. ""No. I did not know that. I guess it''s better to find out this way, isn''t it?""

I have yet to find a doctor. But I really want one. Really.
I know my cholestorol is something like 260. And someone mentioned something about Triglicerides...? Something like that.
Sounds like the kind of thing I should know about, and yet...