（和訳）

こんにちは。はじめに自己紹介をさせていただきます。私はアメリカ南東部出身の３２歳で、体格は良く、身長１９２センチ、体重８２キロです。病気になる前は９４キロありました。幼少期は何でも好きなだけ食べ、残り物まで食べるので「ゴミ箱」と呼ばれていました。喫煙経験はなく、飲酒もほぼしません。だから発病するまで自分を健康的で活発な人間だと思っていました。

高校時代から胸やけ、胃痙攣がありましたが、その時は何か異常が起こっているとは思わず、食あたりか疲労と思っていました。クローン病と診断された今では、これまでの胃痛が異常だったのだとわかります。

大学１年の途中で胃の不調が再び始まりました。胸やけと１日何度もの下痢が数週間続きました。ある晩、ひどい胃痙攣で目が覚め、病院へ行くと、「潰瘍がある」と言われ、痛み止めをもらいました。

これ以来、食生活を変えました。糖分、カフェインを摂らず、水を大量に飲み、毎日エクササイズしました。数ヵ月後には、全て順調に思えるようになりました。

それから１０年が経過したある土曜の朝、目覚めると何か気持ちが悪い感じがしました。毎年、季節の変わり目にひどい副鼻腔感染症になるので、その日は病院に行きました。春の始まり頃でした。病院では７種類の薬を処方されました。その週末は眠れなかったので、月曜の仕事にそなえ処方された薬を全て飲みましだ。その時は知りませんでしたが、そのうち２つは眠くなる薬でした。

職場に行くと同僚に体調を心配されました。まるでゾンビのように見えたそうです。そこでコーヒーを飲みましたが効果がなかったので別のものを飲みました。昼になって、みんなでスパイスの香りが強いインド料理店へ行き、私は１番マイルドな辛さの野菜カレーを食べました。２口食べて、胃がひきつり、捻じれ始めた。私はお金を払うと、死にそうな気分で店を出て、横になるために会議室に向かいました。胸が締め付けられるように痛みました。

その夜、ひどい下痢で何度もトイレへ行きました。昼のカレーのスパイスが原因かと思いました。そして飲んでいた薬に眠くなる作用があることに初めて気づいたので、それから薬は止め、食べる物に注意するようにしました。

数日、下痢と胃痙攣が続きました。胸やけもありました。大学の頃の症状のような気がしましたが、気にしないようにして食べ物に注意しました。しかし、よくなりませんでした。その頃の私は、よく眠れず、夜遅くまで起きていました。仕事の契約更新ができるのか心配していたし、妻が予想外に３人の目の子供を妊娠したからです。

胸やけと不定期な胃痙攣のため病院へ行こうと決めました。胃のレントゲンを撮ったが異常はありませんでした。そして内視鏡検査を受けることになりました。初めてだったので緊張しましたが、おもしろい経験でした。食道に酸によるダメージがありましたが問題はありませんでした。医者はストレスか逆流だと言って薬を処方しました。胃酸の逆流は私の家系にある症状だったのです。

しかし、残念ながら胃痙攣と下痢は治まりませんでした。痛みもひどいので、大きな専門医院で診てもらおうと決めました。症状は日増しにひどくなり、今までにない症状も出てきました。１時間に何度も尿意があり、水分を控えてもまだトイレが近かったのです。

次に訪れた病院でも診断がつきませんでした、トイレが頻繁で食欲がない事から輸液をしました。私は、食物アレルギーがあるので、それを食べないようにしよう、大学時代のように糖分を摂らないでおこうと考え始めました。乳製品とお菓子もやめようとしました。医師は腸の検査をすることにしました。日を決め、検査をした結果、「クローン病」と診断されました。

正直、とても恐ろしかった。そんなはずないから、食生活を工夫したら、何とかなると考えました。しかし数ヵ月続けましたが、症状は続き、どんどん悪くなっていきました。ついに妻の提案で大きな町の病院へ行き血液検査、大腸、小腸検査をしました。医者とのやりとり中で、この病気についてもっと考えなければいけないと感じました。

検査ではこれまでに飲んだことの無い不味い液体を飲まされ、最悪な下痢を経験しましたが、体内がきれいになった気がしました。検査の手順は、興味深いものでした。はじめ胃から腸を検査して何も見つかりませんでしたが、最終的に大腸、小腸に潰瘍を見つかりました。

医師は他の医師と相談するので待つよう言いました。１週間後、クローン病の可能性が高いことを告げられました。クローン病とその治療について説明を受けました。おそろしかった。私は、薬を飲んでも、後でまた新たに薬を飲まなければいけなくなり、ますますお金もかかる、そんな薬は飲むまいと決めました。

この時、私の顔色が悪いので、周りの人は私の様子を尋ねてくれました。食べられない事と下痢が原因だと思いました。体重は１６キロ減り、７８キロになりました。突然便意が襲うので、運動が出来ませんでした。服がゆるくなり、ベルトの穴を増やしました。

妻に「この状態で残りの人生を送りたくない。」と話すと、妻はネットで検索し、家からやや遠いが伝統的な漢方でクローン病を治療する病院を見つけてくれました。漢方なら痛くなさそうだし、嫌ならいつでも西洋医療に戻ればいいと思った。

診断から１週間ほどで松本漢方クリニックを受診しました。家から１時間ほどで着きましましたが、漢方を使ったことがないので、すこし躊躇しました。医院の匂いにさらに足がすくみましだ。入ると患者がいっぱいで驚きました。問診票を記入しているとトイレに行きたくなりました。胃腸が捻じれ、ひどい状態でした。

そして診察が始まったときは、死にそうで、動けないし、集中できませんでした。松本先生は、漢方薬を処方してくれて、医院と薬局で薬をもらいました。

初めて漢方を煎じると、変な香りだったので、漢方専用のヤカンを用意しようと決めました。最初に飲んだ漢方は、以前飲んだことのある鼻炎のサプリメントに似た味でした。他の漢方は今までに味わったことがない味でした。濃厚で苦く、金属とアルカリの味がしました。温めて一気に飲むとなんとか飲めましたが、やはり苦かったです。その後、飲む量が増え、味にも慣れてきました。

ヘルペスウイルスの増殖を抑制する錠剤も飲みました。

１ヵ月が過ぎ、生え際に出来物ができました。顔、目の周り、首まででき、痒くなりました。背中や上腕部にも出来物ができ、特に肘あたりが痒かったです。１週間ほど経過して、周囲の人も出来物に気が付き、どうしたのか尋ねてきました。胸のボタンが当たる場所が痒かったです。次に来院した時、先生に出き物のことを話しました。先生によると中から化学物質を出しているとのことでした。掻かないようにしていた私に、先生は「赤い軟膏を塗っておきなさい」と言われました。そして CRP が基準値の数倍であることについて話をした。

血液検査の項目のいくつに異常がありました。コレステロールが低いのは、あまり食べていないからだろうと思いました。体重は７７キロから７８キロに増えました。ひどい痔になり、トイレで血が付きました。先生に赤と黄色の軟膏を塗るよう指示されたので、２週間続けた。

先生に処方された漢方を１ヵ月続け、食事に注意し、玄米を食べ糖分と乳製品を控えました。胃痙攣は減っていたが、トイレへ行った後は、１、２時間、胃痙攣と痛みがありました。

次に来院したとき、漢方薬の種類が変わりました。苦いものから、少し飲みやすいものになりました。２種類の薬をさらに１ヵ月続け、さらにもう２ヵ月続けました。

ところが、また生え際に出来物ができ始め、顔、首へと以前のように広がっていきました。今度はさらに痒みも痛みも激しく、出き物は胸まででき、他人にも気がつかれるほどひどいものでした。掻かないように努力しました。今回は肘から手首にまで出き物ができた。松本先生から「漢方薬を飲んでいるから体が化学物質を排出しようとしているんだよ」と説明を受けた。

私は２種類の漢方を飲んでおり、１つは以前と同じ赤色で濃厚、味はまあまあ、もう１つはきつくなくシナモンのようでした。現在も毎日錠剤を飲んでいます。この７、８週は便の調子が良く、下痢はほとんどありません。１日か２日に１度、腸の動きがある。これはよい兆しです。トイレに行っても、出血、痛みが減りました。胃痙攣、痛みはあるがひどくはありません。バランスのとれた食事を心掛け、食べたいものを食べています。剣道を再開しましたが、問題なくできています。剣道をすることで、精神的に助けられています。

クローン病と診断され、おそろしい思いをしましたが、今は、回復へ向かっています。良くなっている自信があり、もうすぐ通常の生活ができるだろうと思っています。

（原文）

Hello. First a little about myself. I am currently 32 years old.

I am from the mountains in the south east of the USA. I am of large build.

I am 192cm tall and now weigh 82kg. I was 94kg before I got sick. Growing up I ate everything and anything I wanted. I was often called the trash can as I could always eat leftovers. I have never smoked and I almost never drink. I often try to think of myself as a healthy and active person. That was until I got sick.

Through out my life I have had stomach pains. I never thought that they were anything. Now that I have been pronounced to have Crohn's my eyes have opened a bit to things that have happened throughout my life. Heart burn and stomach cramps have been a problem with me since I was in high school. I thought at that time it was just bad food and just being tired.

I now know that it may have been something else.

About half way through my freshman year of my college I started to have stomach issues again. I often had heartburn and for several weeks had diarrhea several time a day. One night I woke up from very bad stomach cramps.

I went to the hospital. There they said I might have an ulcer and gave me a drink to help with the pain. From that point on I changed my diet. I cut back to almost no sweets. I made sure to drink a lot of water every day and I drank no caffeine. I tried to exercise every day. After several months of this everything seemed fine.

Skip to 10 years later. I woke up one day not feeling well. I went to the doctors on a Saturday morning for my yearly seasonal medication.

Every year I get a bad sinus infection when the seasons change. It was early spring at that time. The doctor gave me about 7 different types of medication to take. Over the weekend I didn't sleep well. I decided to take everything I was prescribed before I went to work on Monday. What I didn't know was that two of them medications would make me sleepy. Right as I got to work my coworker asked me if I was okay. He said I looked like a zombie.

I went and bought some coffee. Sadly it didn't help so I bought another.

The morning moved on and we went out for lunch. We went to an Indian curry place for lunch. The smell of spices outside were always strong. I ordered some vegetable curry in the mildest spice level possible. On my second bite my stomach began to twist and everything started to cramp up. I paid and went to my meeting location to lay down. I felt like death. Everything from my chest down was tight and hurt.

That night I had several times where I needed to use the restroom and it was very painful diarrhea. I thought that maybe it was just from the spice earlier in the day. I decided to look and sure enough my medications were what made me sleepy. Several of them had sleep warnings on them. I decided not to take anymore and just be careful of what I was

eating.

For the next couple days I continued to have the stomach cramps and diarrhea. I often found myself to have heartburn as well. It felt very much like what happened in college. I let it go and just tried to be careful of what I ate. However no matter what I did it didn't get better.

At that time I was not sleeping very well. I was staying awake very late every night. I was having a lot of stress related to the fact that my work contract was almost up and I was going to have to fight to get it renewed. Also my wife was pregnant with our third baby. It was a bit of a surprise and to say we weren't ready is a bit of an understatement.

I decided to see a doctor about my heartburn and random stomach cramps. He gave me some medication and we decided to check my stomach. He started with an X-ray and could not find anything. After that we scheduled a camera examination. I was a bit nervous as I had not done it before. It was very interesting and amazing to see what they could do with the camera.

During the examination the doctor found that I had some acid damage in my esophagus but no unclear. He thought that it may be stress or acid reflux.

I thought it might be that as acid reflux is common in my family. He gave me some medication for it and time went on.

Sadly the stomach cramps and random diarrhea did not stop. The pain started to be rather troublesome. I decided it was time to move up to a bigger hospital that specialized more on stomach issues. I was begging to feel much worse on a daily bases. I started to have some other issues. At times I would start to need to pee. I would then have the urge to pee again several times an hour. I would not drink anything and still feel like I needed to pee.

I went to the new hospital and again the doctors were not sure what the issue was. They decided to give me an IV to get my fluid levels back up since I was using the restroom so often and not able to eat. I was begging to think that I had some time of food allergy and started to cut things out. I was doing no sweets as I had done before in college. I also tried cutting out dairy and sweets. After telling this to the doctor he decided we needed to check my intestines. We scheduled a day and they checked. It was inconclusive at that time and this was the first time that the doctor told me about Crohn's .

To be honest the talk of Crohn's scared me. I thought that couldn't be that and I decided to just keep up my diet and try and fight on. For several months I continued and the symptoms continued. Things got worse and worse. Finally my wife suggested that we got to a new large city owned hospital that had just opened. I decided to listen to her. We went over everything with the doctor and he again brought up the idea of Crohn's.

I decided to give it a bit more of a thought. The doctor ordered a full check of my blood work and to do a check of both my small and large intestines.

From the day before they had me drink some of the worst tasting water I have ever had. It maybe me have some of the worst diarrhea of my life but I felt cleaned out. Again I was amazed to watch the procedure and see what was happening. They did the exam and went through my intestines all the way to my stomach. Going up they found almost nothing. However on the way out they found ulcers lining up and down my large and small intestines.

The doctor said he would check with his other doctors and get back to me in a bit. After about a week we met with him and he said it was a very high chance of Crohn's. He explained what Crohn's was and what types of treatment there are now. This was all very scary. I decided that I didn't want to take meds for the rest of my life just to need new meds later and spend more and more money.

At this point everyone I knew was asking how I was. I often heard that I looked like. Several people said I looked blue. This is due to the fact that I couldn't eat and the chronic diarrhea. At this time I had gone down to 78Kg. I had lost nearly 16kg without exercise or a diet. I couldn't not exercise as they sudden urge to use the restroom was very bad. None of my clothes fit and I was having to punch new holes in my belts just to keep my slacks up.

I told my wife that I didn't want to spend the rest of my life doing this and that the medication might be what we have to do. She went on line and told me she found a place kind of far from our house in Ibaraki city where I could get treatment for my Crohn's using traditional herbal medication. I figured it couldn't hurt and if anything I could always go back to the western meds if I needed to.

Soon after we found the new hospital we went right away. I think it might have been a week or so after my diagnoses from the large hospital.

It took about an hour or so to get there. I was semi hesitant as we don't use herbal medication in the USA.

Outside I was semi scared. I could smell the doctor's office and it was very hard on my nose. In fact it is still very hard for me. I thought that it would be empty but was surprised that when we got there the entire waiting room was full. Right as we got in and wrote all the information down it happened again and I needed to use the restroom. My cramping started and I felt horrible. When it was my time to meet the doctor I felt like death. I could barely move and to be honest couldn't really pay attention. He gave us a prescription for Crohn's and sent us to the pharmacy to get more of the medication I needed.

That was the first time I had every made my own medication. The boiling process made everything smell very strange. It stained one of my cooking pots and I decided the next day I would need some new pots just for cooking that medication. The first one I drank tasted like a supplement I had taken before for my nose. The other those tasted like nothing I had ever had before in my life. It was thick and heavy and hurt my mouth as I drank it. It had a very heavy metal tasted and was very alkali. I found that the only way I could drink it was a shot and it needed to be warm.

Even then it still made my mouth hurt.

I started to drink more at one time and I was starting to get use to it. On the side I was told to take pills to prevent from developing herpes.

After about a month of taking the pills and drinking the herbal mix I started to break out with pimples around my hairline. It worked down my face and around my ears and then down my neck. As it spread it began to itch more and more. I soon noticed that I had pimples forming on my shoulders and down my forearms. The ones on the back of my forearms near my elbow itched the most. This continued for a week before people started to ask me about it. By then it had moved down my chest and I was itchy around the top button of my shirt.

On my next visit to the doctors I mentioned the pimples. The doctor told me that this was due to my body pushing out chemicals. I tried my best not to scratch them and was told to apply the red herbal cream they gave me. We talked about how my CRP level was several times that of a normal person. Several things in my blood work were off. My fats were low. This was due to the fact I still couldn't eat very much. At that time I was 77-78kg.

Another issue that I brought up was hemorrhoids. I had started to have very bad hemorrhoids. I noticed that from time to time I had blood in the toilet after I had used the restroom. He told me to use a yellow and red herbal cream to help. I continued this treatment for another two weeks.

I continued on this set of medication for about a month. I still tried to watch what I was eating and changed to eating Genmai (unpolished brown rice) over normal white rice when I was at home. I was also cutting out a lot of sweets and no milk. I started to notice less cramping during the day and mainly only pain from time to time in my stomach. After using the restroom however I almost always had very hard stomach cramps and pain for a couple hours.

The next time I went to the doctor two weeks later I changed my medication again. I changed from one of the very bitter ones to a much more drinkable one. I continued with these two types of meds for another month.

Following that I was able to drink everything much easier. I continued this set for another two months.

Then it happened again. After several weeks of clear skin I started to break out again with pimples around my hair line. It moved down my face and around my neck just as before. This time the itch and pain was much worse. The pimples even moved down my chest and around my stomach. Again I did my best not to scratch them and they were very noticeable to others.

From my elbows down to my wrists I had many more pimples than the first time. When I went to the doctor the next time he again told me that my body was trying to push out chemicals and it was due to the herbal medication I was taking.

Since then I have been taking two types of herbal medication. One of them is the red one from before. It is a bit more thick and tastes okay.

The other is much thinner and tastes to me like cinnamon. I am currently still taking the pills every day. For the last seven to eight weeks I have been on a normal restroom schedule. The occurrence of diarrhea is very rare now. I am down to once a day or once every two days to have a bowel movement.

I was told that this is a good sign. This has caused less bleeding and pain after using the restroom. I still have cramps and some pain but it is nowhere near as bad. I am also able to eat whatever I want and I am just trying to make sure that I have a balanced meal and eat throughout the day. I recently started to do kendo again and found that I had no problems while or after practicing. Doing the exercise has really helped to lift my spirits.

After hearing how scary Crohn's is and scared I was, I am now on the road to recovery and I am confident that I am going to get better and hope that everything will be back to normal soon.