An Apology For Not Sharing The Miracle Of Being Cured Of Hepatitis C And A Long Silence

On March 1, 2012, I went in to Dr. Peter Ruane's office on Olympic Avenue in Los Angeles to mark the sixth month of treatment. It actually was a little over six months since I took my first dosage of the drugs on September 18, 2012. I was told I would find out the results of the clinical trials and whether or not I had been clear of the Hepatitis C virus since the 4th week of the trials. I knew that I had been clear for the past two months, but if I had been clear since the 4th week, the trials were over, and I was officially cured. I must admit I was not surprised by the answer.

John Lavitt Taking His First Dose With A Smile On 9-18-11

As I sat in the waiting room, Chris Rice, the nurse who manages the trials, entered my name into the computer database in the back offices. I literally hear a whoop of delight as Chris came running back into the waiting room with my results in hand. With tears in his eyes, jumping up and down, Chris told me that I was cured, the first one in the Los Angeles trials, and I no longer had to take the medicine anymore. Finally, after six months of pain and suffering, it was over. And I was jubilant and exhausted and speechless and calling everybody and utterly overwhelmed.

Before I go any further, I want to apologize for everyone who has been reading this blog for not letting you know sooner and for once again sinking into the morass of a long silence. There is no reason that makes any sense. I should have told you right away, even if most of you found out on Facebook or other means and ways from text messages to phone calls in which the information was shared. It was almost as if the miracle was too much to handle when it came to these words, and there was so much to say that I strangely or typically chose to say nothing. I am sorry.

The first thing I did when I heard was to call and text everyone close to me, letting them know what had happened. The love and celebratory responses I experienced took my breath away. When I went into the examination room to take off my clothes, get several vials of my blood taken once again, and have the remains of the rash and everything else examined, I was surprised by what happened next. 

Chris came in with my files and he was overflowing with happiness and joy. Although they ran both Hepatitis C and HIV clinical trials in the office, Chris told me that they had never seen someone go through such extreme side effects and not stop treatment and resign from a trial. He described as the most courageous (sometimes I think the most stupid, even being healed) patient they had ever seen, and he was so happy that the result of the trials had been successful. I was 90 to 95% certain of being cured of Hepatitis C, although my blod would have to be taken once a month for the next six months to guarantee the results. Still, I would take those odds in Vegas on any day. Chris actually told me that seeing me cured gave a sense of meaning to his work and this most recent of clinical trials for a drug that is never coming to market. Why? It has already been eclipsed.

A lot has happened in the past ten days, and I will be writing many blogs describing the strange and wonderful and surprisingly difficult experience of being cured. It is beautiful and lovely, but it is not all good and the minefields that have revealed themselves have been surprising. It is important for me to note two things now that will be described in detail later...

1. I stopped taking the drugs - the Ribavirin and the Interferon - five days before I found out my results. The sudden increase in disgusting side effects was crazy. Every time another one popped up, I would shake my head and say out loud, "Really? After all I have been through?" I knew I was cured on a holistic level that was intense and profound. I have never been so in touch with my body and I knew without question it was the right decision.
2. The first thing I did after leaving the doctor's office, after buying a bag of fresh jacima, coconut, and pineapple with a touch of chile and lots of lemon from a Mexican fruit cart, was to call everyone who had helped me through the worst times of the clinical trials when the rash would not stop itching and the staph infection was screaming and it was hell on earth. What I did was express gratitude and thank them for being there for me. When you see someone you care about suffering on such an intense level, it is hard not to turn away.

My First Hepatitis Free Los Angeles Fruit Cart Experience

Just Joined Networked Blogs As I Try To Continue Optimization. A Facebook Page Is Next

Follow this blog

I just joined Network Blogs as I begin trying to optimize Spirit And Consequences. What a concept for a guy who works in that business to actually try to distribute his own blog. I really want to get the message out there, and if you are willing to help, it would mean a lot.

A Facebook Page is next on the list, and thank you for your ongoing support!

Night 136 Slipping Into Morning — Four New Poems (Between, His Best Customer, Licks Her Fur, In This Stillness)

I have been revising all of my old poetry, the almost 150 pages of loose first drafts that I found in my storage space from the past 20 odd years, and the writing is going well with a precise and finished feel. It is a pleasure to know that John Lavitt is singing the song he was put here on this earth to sing. 

The Puzzle of a Man - Let Me Show You What Can Be Found Within...

Here are four new poems...

between

between the first step taken

and lying down on a leather couch,

between the opening of a door

and the turning of the bedroom lock,

between putting pen to paper

and checking out what’s in the fridge

fall the sunken eyes of ennui.

between the biting of a nail

and the opening of a fist,

between the twitching of a palm

and the raising of a thumb,

between the flapping of tongues

and the calmness of silence

stands the bright shadow of courage.

his best customer

when the crack dealer

told me late one night

i was his best customer,

maybe, just maybe

it was time to stop.

he hides salvation

under his tongue;

sweet bitter ivory flakes.

perfect hunger answered,

in a transubstantiation

as the product is spit

into my quivering palm.

the best have dry mouths.

new boys all spittle and slobber,

the sacred reduced to sticky icky

and the eucharist wiped away.

i never learned his name

but he always took my money.

as i drove away drowning,

he hid the silver in his jowls.

licks her fur

with a royal languor,

the persian licks her fur,

clean as only a cat can be.

hairless apes waste so much water,

washing away the wondrous dirt,

ignorant to the story in the earth.

barely recall what the pet looked like,

all those years ago on that velvet couch

in an expensive paris apartment.

i search today for the feline soul,

but the cat's eye infected by invention;

there is nothing to find beyond myself.

in this stillness

my fingers grazed across the shallow of your back,

you spoke so softly, licking the inside of my ear.

each fleeting headstand worth ten thousand words.

you were there and i wasn’t. reality long gone.

i sang songs so sweet the emptiness disappeared,

i sang of a wooden puppet on the strings of desire.

you left me leaning on the crutches of bones,

my proclamations knocked over the ashtray.

did i make a mess when the rose failed to flower?

after the awkward hours of that night,

the first and last departure came and went.

did you pass the shallows, a sunken ship?

i always manage to stumble in a passionate fog,

my eyes forever blind to the obvious signs.

as the door closed, the boy still believed.

in the stillness of the darkest hour,

i still watch your car, behold one more vanishing,

the darkest car of the darkest night.

beyond the wailing of city lights,

you faded amid such glorified memories.

i would have forgiven you if you had returned.

the myth of the return everlasting,

fireworks under my skin, explosive beating;

frustrated, i cannot be still in this stillness.

my emptiness was never about you.

an impoverished tongue speaking in tongues.

every night, the fetish is born anew.

i do not even remember what you looked like.

who you really are lost in the drowning tides.

i craft this straw ballad to be, a dream solitary.

if you dream of love and you are alone,

do you betray the goddess of the heart?

i don’t know. i nod off in a vacant bed.

Thanksgiving - Grateful For The Gift Of Writing - Three Recent Poems - shedding ashes, the secrets of each muse & never mine alone

As I itch on my bed, I have been writing and rewriting three recent poems that I wrote, revised or took to the next level of expression in the past month. This is my Thanksgiving gift with nothing bad about nothing and the true gratitude for my creative talents and the gift of this rare human birth. So here we go, and thank you for taking the time to read and comment if you are so moved or please ask me any questions that you might have. In any case, please enjoy... John

Three Poems by John Lavitt (November 24, 2011)

shedding ashes

she looks like a hot woman drinking,

she becomes a little girl weeping,

so young, still the shadows of a child,

lurching through vertigo, shedding ashes.

if you gaze gently into her eyes,

if you listen softly as she speaks,

a sudden smile, sweet and surprised,

emerges. there is a flower veiled,

beyond the shards of animal memory,

no exit possible, the fondle lurking,

cries muffled, her home a wicked altar,

so much innocence sacrificed so soon.

enough diagnosis to make you feel better;

didn’t you once boast of life preservers?

but what can i do? this is just in passing.

what medicine of earth and sky?

how many need a vision possible,

not visionary, no light show from heaven,

but a modest map of a future rendered

where each step taken leads.

if she beholds a path leading,

a vision of a woman possible,

her shattering less than a shadow,

a witness to the morning sun.

the secrets of each muse

who could paint such angry beauty?

not quite angry and definitely not bitter,

but exacting, dramatic and classical;

this woman sings of Europe before the fall.

Modigliani releases the flow of such softness,

his brush baring the aristocracy of beauty,

long and languorous, a sexual calm in color,

but blunting the elemental edges of this woman.

a strange mixture expressed in dichotomy;

a mix of a sunset stroll in the Mediterranean

with cigarette smoke rising in Bohemian shadows.

she cannot be captured without the chains.

the painter required, of course, Egon Schiele;

each stark line reveals her sexuality radiant,

battling against death, against cages respectable.

her truth exposed, the lovely flaws of a girl lost.

such beauty caught can never truly convey

three dimensions, the dark corners and closed drawers,

all she fears and all she loves: there are certain dreams,

the secrets of each muse the artist can never betray.

never mine alone

in the bright ambition of the waking hour,

there awakes a certain inclination, a need

to capture the world with the art of words.

this is immortality, my name carved in stone,

or just one more simulation of the snickering past;

so many have walked these cornerstones before,

each writer dancing in the whirl of unique discovery.

i believed in my significance. this is my comfort zone.

yes, i have written revolutionary poems before,

when i was younger, when i was young,

everything appeared to be the very first:

i was raising the curtain of the world!

repeated postures, the steps of an antiquated dance

where each poem sings of next year’s revolution.

but if i have never in truth been the original voice,

what is the point of scratching out these copies?

beyond today's survival, the breath of expression is sacred.

yes, this primal path not cut by the soles of my feet.

other footsteps trodden, fossilized imprints of the greats,

but each new step taken is a wondrous mystery.

the critics braying; thousands of greater poets past,

the bold first step long forgotten in ash and dust.

no, my friends, this graven path was never mine alone.

countless steps taken before, countless to come.