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Comment by treeman79 | Hacker News Reader

My dad used to joke about how placebos helped my mom and older sisters many body ache complaints. I just thought severe pain was normal until I was diagnosed with autoimmune, MS and a few other things. Doctors told me for years it was just in my head and that I just needed medication for anxiety.

Proper medication and diet changes resolved pain and anxiety.

My mom and sisters all have same issues. Dad and doctors gaslight them and me for decades.

The highlight when I was in the ER coughing up blood. ER doctors explaining how I was faking it since my blood work was normal. Until chest X rays came back. Then doctor also went pale.

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The more I talk to people in my life (friends, family, mentors, teachers, etc) the more this story seems to repeat itself. People who have a somewhat uncommon issue, and are forced to go from doctor to doctor until one finally recognizes the problem and knows what to do.

I think that we have a couple problems. One is that we just don't have enough doctors to give thorough care to each person. They're under too much time crunch to really investigate. The second is that the human body is hopelessly complex and I'm not sure humans will ever be able to be good at diagnosing problems with it effectively.

Until we develop real gAI and much better imaging techniques, I'm not sure we will ever solve this problem in a satisfactory way.

How did they think you can fake coughing up blood? Fake coughing, sure, but blood?

I know hypochondria exists, but I think doctors should start out by taking patients seriously and gather some actual proof that a patient's real problem is hypochondria before dismissing their complaints.

Blood was earlier in morning. Urgent care wouldn’t see me. Was super pale. ER figured I was faking or that I was confusing muscle pain for something serious. This was actually the second time I went to the ER. First time they didn’t xray and sent me home.

This is an illustration about not just placebos but how delusional people are.

These are doctors who were taught to be investigative and logical yet they were so delusional they have to say that you were faking the blood that you were coughing up.

A lot of "logical" people like to rag on cults or religious groups but what they don't understand is that delusion is pervasive. Most humans lie to themselves extensively and you dear reader, are likely not an exception.

Take for example the armies of people who told me AI won't ever take over their jobs and chatGPT is just a stochastic parrot. There is merit to both sides of the debate, but I guarantee you a lot of the hostility against AI comes from delusional lies people tell themselves to cover up a possible future trivializes their job skills. Not trying to start an argument on AI here, but I bring this topic up because it's the most current example of mass delusion I can think of. You have to bring up the current delusion to show people how strong the capacity to lie to oneself is.

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