I took peg interferon and ribvirin for 48 weeks from 2002 to 2003. I was born with the hep C and transmitted it to my son. My mom almost died and had a life saving liver transplant in 2000. It scared me tremendously for her but also for myself. In addition,
I was in dentistry and left like I had leprosy. I knew in my heart that I desperately needed to kill this virus. I will say interferon has been the worst decision I have ever made in my life. I have suffered from extremely painful depression, anxiety, fatigue, hypothyroidism, food intolerance, and hair loss ever since. I turned jewelry black while I was taking the injections and perfume smelled weird on me. That is the least of my worries though.
My quality of life has been pure hell due to my mental well being. I would have rather have died from Hep C and had a short happy life than to suffer this anguish. If I received 100 million dollars for taking interferon I would have declined in a heart beat. I've never been the same. I lost my personality, joy, ambition , intelligence, energy...basically my whole essence of what it means to be alive and thrive. Now, I just exist in misery. I have tried practically everything to try and get help to no avail. Doctors and psychiatrists seem to think its all in my head. All I know is that I used to be super happy, confident, ambitious and fun. I have had to pretend to try to be a fraction of who I used to be. The mask is hard to carry. The pain of life has been beyond hard for 19 years. How could they have ever given this medicine to any human being? This is truly hell on earth.