Would you be buried alive for 48hr for a million dollars?
You are buried in a coffin 6ft deep, with no light or cell phone. There is only a small tube connected to the coffin from outside that allows you to breathe (edit: you can breathe with no difficulty). After 48 hours, you are dug up and given 1 million dollars. Do you do it?
Edit: No food and water, no diaper, and no contact with the outside world. Once buried, they leave for 48hr and come back to dig you up. The coffin is only wide enough for you to lay on your back (no rolling around), and the inside is wood and not particularly comfortable. The only items you're allowed to bring with you are life sustaining medication (e.g. an asthma inhaler). No knocking yourself out with pills or anxiety meds. The money is a briefcase full of cash.
I take meds (protonix I think - there have been so many), which help, but they only kill the acid, not stop everything from going into my throat (weak sphincter). So basically, it feels like I have the post nasal drip from hell in the back of my throat.
Now if you make the coffin where I can keep my head raised, that's completely different.
As an aside, I've discussed surgery a couple times, but the last time (years ago), they basically said it only works for like a decade and you can't throw up. Even the doctors were pretty meh about it. Anything changed? How was your experience?
For me it's kinda like lasik - I have contacts that give me 20/10 vision and I'm so used to them, why risk it. With Gerd, I have meds that work and the only thing that really sucks are the cavities and waiting for breakfast. So is it worth it?
The surgery was worth it for me for several reasons, and I realize that these reasons aren't applicable to most people.
I have very bad asthma, and apparently GERD can contribute to it quite a bit. Even though I was on a PPI I still had reflux fumes coming up out of my gut that I would breathe in. Strengthening the pyloric sphincter kept that from happening. I noticed that my breathing improved drastically a few days after the operation. I also had a hiatal hernia, which was likely not helping my breathing.
I also noticed that right around the time I stared using a PPI that I also developed multiple food allergies. It could be a coincidence, but even my gastroenterologist said that the change in digestion from the PPI might have contributed to development of the allergies. And I developed a few more along the way. So getting off of the PPI was important to me in that regard.
Anyway, my experience has been pretty positive. I can burp. Not sure if I can throw up from my stomach yet, but I have thrown up stuff that was sitting in my esophagus (I tried challenging foods too quickly street my surgery - learned my lesson there). I can finally sleep flat without regurgitation. So I'm pretty happy.
I don't know if you have any desire to get off of Protonix, but if you ever do, I read this recently and it's pretty interesting: