Autoimmune Go Fish

I was talking with a friend today. She also has an autoimmune disease, and we were sharing our laundry lists of symptoms. 

We both agreed that the worst symptom of them all, by far, is the life-altering fatigue. She said that when she sees the doctor, fatigue trumps any of the other symptoms that she is dealing with. And there are plenty of other symptoms. 

Wouldn't it be nice if we could turn all of our symptoms into playing cards? That way, all of us with autoimmune disease could get together and play some kind of card game. A game with rules that allowed players to swap cards. I do think that the fatigue card would trump all others, but other people may not feel the same. 

I can see it now. 

We would all be gathered together sitting with our feet up in cushy recliners, surrounded by cases of bottled water. No, wait - wait - we'd all have those goofy hats where you can put a water bottle on either side of your head, and there's a tube going down to your mouth. You know the ones -  I think they are actually for die hard beer drinkers, but if the hat fits........put water in it. 

And each of us would have our own cool-mist humidifier aimed directly at us. Yes, yes - and we'd all have stacks of our favorite cookies with something to dunk them in. Because who can eat a cookie without dunking it, if you have sicca syndrome? 

Of course we would all need the rules to the game posted on a huge, easy to read poster, since we would all forget the basic concepts in a heartbeat. 

"If you take my fatigue card, I'll take your dry skin AND irritable bowl syndrome."

"Nah. But I'll trade you my cotton mouth and brain fog." 

Too bad there isn't a way for us all to trade away all of our symptom cards, and start with a whole new deck.