Self-Inflicted NASH Cirrhosis

[Guest guest]

Dear Group:

I am usually a lurker here, but try to give helpful answers when nobody else can

or does (which is very rare). I am a 44 year old father of 2 teen daughters,

and was diagnosed with NASH Cirrhosis a few years ago. When I say diagnosed, I

mean: I had some mildly out of whack liver tests way back when I was 25, yet it

was called Fatty Liver and the acronym 'NASH' was never mentioned. Recently one

Internist expressed his suspicion that those were the beginning signs of NASH,

way back then, though they soon went away (never to be seen again in my

bloodwork) after I lost %15 of my body fat (per doctor's orders). That got me

below 200lbs, when I was 6ft tall.

For those of you who Don't know, NASH essentially means I didn't get Cirrhosis

by drinking alcohol. I guess I just never had a taste for the stuff and hardly

ever drank even small amounts my whole life.

SO ON TO MY QUESTION, for those of you who aren't already bored with this story,

and are somewhat familiar with NASH. I never really was a good eater (I guess

you can call me " really picky " , and veggies have never been something I beat the

door down for), with the exception being a few years when I raced bicycles back

in high school.

A growing problem now however, is that my family is absolutely convinced that I

gave myself this disease, because I didn't eat right. So now, on top of dealing

with all the painful and difficult symptoms of this disease while I await a

transplant, the people I most count on for help and moral support are sometimes

adversarial towards me because of how they perceive my years of eating.

I had a lengthy 'discussion' with one of the more mature ones last night, and

afterwards I felt as though they wanted my tomb stone to say " here lies Jim, who

ate himself to death " (not really but you get the idea).

I am 170lbs and have been making changes in my diet for the past several years,

but I guess the changes are not fast enough and radical enough for my family. I

just can't seem to get a break in that department (and maybe I don't deserve

one).

So I guess my question is, is NASH always a dietary disease? I look around and

see people twice my weight who presumably don't have NASH, and have also known

people who eat worse than I ever did (for example: near-daily Pizzas and a case

of Coke to wash it down).

So then, is NASH ever a genetic disease? I've already got one entirely

unrelated hereditary disease that I was born with; it causes me to break bones

easily (I've had 61 painful fractures so far - 13 over the past year).

Though it may sound like it, I'm not trying to make excuses to escape my

personal responsibility with NASH, but at the same time, I feel like I've had a

lot of other accomplishments as a father, husband, former employer, etc, only to

be remembered by some crumby eating habits.

So are there other ways to get NASH? I've asked my Hep. Doctor about much of

this, but as somebody on this list recently said, I get about 5 minutes with him

(he's very busy) and there is never enough time to ask all the follow-up

questions that need to be asked. Hopefully somebody here can give me some

direction and advice; maybe even make my home life more harmonious if that's

called for. But if those answers are in fact 'yes' - " here lies Jim who ate

himself to death " , I'll be able come to terms with that too (it will just take a

little getting used to). The TRUTH is what I'm after, and is all that matters

to me.

Thanks for listening! This group is great, and is in my prayers.

--Jim