The severe itching has returned. My arms are inflamed and covered in rashes that resemble first degree burns just before they turn into blistering, second degree ones, that vivid ruby rose color that looks like I feel asleep in the Arizona sun. I feel like a shell of the creature who was once called a man.

Today marks week five since I started taking hydroxychloroquine. It is not yet working. I try to stay optimistic, to remind myself many patients only notice effects after six weeks, most notice nothing until months later. But until then, am I supposed to live in hell?

Meanwhile, my primary rheumatologist has been tapering me off steroids, slowly reducing the dosage to keep my immune system from overreacting. Taking corticosteroids for more than a few months could cause damage to my immune and endocrine systems.

Must I choose between damaging my body years from now and living in this itching, burning hell? Is the price of a quality life today a shorter tomorrow?

Some evenings, I curse my doctors’ treatment plan. Other evenings I curse myself. Others still, I curse whatever natural or supernatural entity decided I must suffer yet again, as though Scheuermann’s disease wasn’t enough, as though ADHD and depression haven’t been enough, as though life isn’t already hard enough. What kind of being would cripple his creation with a rash that makes you wish you were dead?

In reply to some twisted medical corollary to French mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal’s famous wager, I told my girlfriend I would gladly trade a long life in hell for a short one in paradise.

Must I make this choice?

To quote Djimon Hounsou’s character in Gladiator, Juba, “Not yet, not yet.”

One more week. Can I make it? Yes, but will six weeks be enough?