"Being a Mets fan is not an auto-immune disease, though it might sometimes feel that way."

Ted Berg writes a touching and courageous piece about his own health and being a Met fan:

"Here’s my deal: I have a pair of incurable but non-terminal auto-immune diseases -– multiple sclerosis and Crohn’s disease. I’m not seeking pity and I don’t want to bog this post down with personal medical history, but it turns out they can team up to be a real pain in the ass sometimes. I’m lucky in that I’ve avoided the worst of both, but I found out about the M.S. because a side effect of medication I was taking for Crohn’s amplified the symptoms. I went off that medication upon the M.S. diagnosis in 2008 and suffered a Crohn’s flare-up this summer. I went on steroids to calm it, started absorbing food again and gained a bunch of weight. The weight puts extra stress on my back that’s already aching from the M.S., but working out to try to drop that weight –- as I did this morning –- makes my back hurt more. And painkillers can trigger the Crohn’s disease again."

"Being a Mets fan is not an auto-immune disease, though it might sometimes feel that way. And being a Mets fan these past few years has been rough, at least relative to being a fan of most other teams or being a Mets fan back in the late 80s."

"Rooting for a team means emotionally investing in something, and that brings with it the risk of some pain –- not lasting physical pain, but pain nonetheless. But when that pain comes like it has the last few years, what’s the sense in wallowing in it?

Especially with baseball. It’s baseball. Baseball. For one thing, you can opt out at any time. If the Mets actually make you miserable, stop following the Mets. If you can’t or won’t, I suggest for the sake of your sanity finding whatever small shred of hope you have for the upcoming season and seizing it, rather than floundering about in so much Met-fan self-pity."

Well said Mr. Berg. Let's Go Mets.