House-Hold Drama

Last night, my husband and I were watching House, the medical drama that focuses on the brilliant but infuriating, eponymously named Dr. House. The featured illness for the episode was Multiple Sclerosis, which you may or may not know is a progressive disease that attacks the nervous system, compromising mental and physical ability, sometimes to the point where the patient cannot speak, walk, or write. As far as I know, there is no cure.

"But I have that sickness," Dean commented, not even taking his eyes off the TV screen, "and I'm fine."

"WHAT!?" I exclaimed, already panicking in my head: How could I not know this, after eleven years of marriage? Was he in some kind of remission? How long did he have before extreme symptoms manifested? Was there something we could do to alleviate the situation? Could Sage inherit this illness? What steps should we be taking?

"I think Zsazsa Padilla has it too," he continued, still glued to the television, "and she seems fine. I mean, it's just that bendy spine thing, right?"

"Excuse me," I clarified, gathering up the tattered remains of my shredded serenity, "are you talking about scoliosis? You know, curvature of the spine, as opposed to sclerosis, degeneration of mental and motor functions?"

"Ohhh," said my brilliant but occasionally infuriating husband. "Right, yeah, scoliosis! So that's a different thing, then?"

I would have killed him, but I remembered in time it would be oxymoronic to murder someone because they made you fear for their health.