Screaming Bloody Murder in the Streets and other Medical Advances.

(April is National Sarcoidosis Awareness Month)

We Americans are a verbose lot, especially in large perturbed groups when we smell an outrageous injustice. Just ask any AIG executive hiding under a manhole cover. So it is with trepidatious joy that I reiterate the coming of the First Annual April Sarcoidosis Awareness Month.

This penchant we have for spontaneous civil uproar makes even French car burning seem trivial, for even the sweetest of our blue-haired yankee grannies can turn into a fearsome cabal of geriatric pitbulls should an unfair tax be levied on doilies or personal massagers. American history is rife with a particular brand of sit-up-and-take-notice half-sarcastic public hoo ha. The Boston Tea Party comes to mind, where our colonial forefathers thought the best way to show old King George that a $19.95 tax per tea bag was unacceptable, was to turn Boston harbor in to one big Nestea plunge. Although I must admit, the Native American Indian costumes were a little over the top… but that’s American showmanship for ya. Even in 1773.

Americans do tend to loll around and gripe a lot, our Constitution is written in a way that preserves our inalienable God-given right to gripe like foul-mouthed dockworkers. And there's plenty of room in the document reserved for bitching and moaning as well. As long as we are allowed to freely complain, it takes the steam off the kettle and those in power can relax a little at night, knowing that we are just making noise around the dinner table and not purchasing pitch forks and E-Z-Flame Frankenstein’s Monster hunting torches.

But…

But there is a point where Americans will get up out of their lazy-boys, put down their Iron City beers or Starbucks Double-Fudgical-Frothical-Obama-Slamma-Café-Late’s and spontaneously organize. And where there is a major injustice involved Americans are always ready to make it right. Especially if it involves being loud in large groups and screaming bloody murder. We just have a knack for telling some ass-clown to stick-it. Whether its George in 1773, or Adolph in 1941, or some little dictator in elevator shoes with a fetish for western Hustler models by the dozen, launching intercontinental ballistic missiles.

So it would seem that even on a smaller scale, within a subset of the populous, let’s say… Americans with Sarcoidosis, that we can be just as snarly, snarky, stentorian and sonorous when our sense of justice has been tweaked.

This coming month of April, the United States Congress has formally given we who suffer with Sarcoidosis, official writ to caterwaul about it as much as law-abiding citizens may without disturbing anyone after beddie-bye time (check your local statutes and ordinances.)

I am not advocating riots or civil disobedience, nor a 300 mile walk to the sea to make salt. But I am advocating noise. The good kind. A temporary moratorium on “not usually saying anything.” Getting up, standing up, and announcing in a clear, articulate tone, that you (or someone you love) has SARCOIDOSIS. And be prepared to answer all those stares from folks who’s heads have just tilted like a dog that hears a funny sound.

Read, Download, and Order a gaggle of the timely and most excellent Sarcoidosis Brochures the the FSR has taken such great steps to craft. Real information by real medical professionals with a vested PERSONAL interest in our shared disease; not stale information from some dusty Merk manual from 1954 or some internet quack with eight cure-all websites begging for $49.95 in love-donations.

Spread the word and the information. Challenge yourself to speak out, especially if that is not your normal nature. If you are going to suddenly get puffed up about an issue, I can’t think of a better one than ours. Hand out brochures, email web links, wear a wristband or sport a ribbon on your blouse or car. Wear a Snarky Sarkie shirt proudly or flash a mug at the office. If you’ve mentioned Sarc before, do it again. Drop famous names like Karen Duffy, Bernie Mac, and Reggie White. Cross join other Sarc groups and promote our own little FSR Stop Sarcoidosis sandbox right here. Invite friends and family to read what we post everyday and join as advocates. Ask folks to write and call their representatives in government on behalf of Sarcoidosis. Sign a petition. Make a petition! Perhaps even Oprah deserves to be pestered a bit more, surely someone she knows suffers with Sarcoidosis. Sing a silly song. Raise the roof! Have a Sarc Party! Engage, inform, and involve.

In closing, if all you do is make just one person raise their eyebrows enough to take more than a fleeting interest in Sarcoidosis, than you will have done more than has been done in the past. We need you. We all need you.

Remember, April is Sarcoidosis Awareness Month, so make it April all year long.

— My name is theGardener; I have two dogs, a cat, and sarcoidosis.

PS. We love and support or international friends with Sarcoidosis, and we know they love and support us, so forgive this Gardeneristic Yankeecentric fluff.

"Don't just complain... Be a Snarky Sarkie!" Click Here!

Read More of TheGardener's Journal Here.