Around the first part of April, I got sick, with standard flu-like symptoms: chills, fever (99° to 102°), aches, headache, generally wanted to stay in bed. After about a week and a half of that, I went to see my primary. He told me "yeah, you're sick, but you should be OK soon" After another week or so, he basically said the same thing, but ordered some blood work. The tests confirmed that I was indeed fighting something, but didn't say what. Doc thought it was probably something like mono, told me I'd be better in a few more weeks (!). A week or so later, I started getting a "blind" spot in my left eye. Doc refers me to ophthalmology; initial diagnosis is possible
central serous retinopathy. Get a fluorescein angiogram; retinal specialist kicks me back to ophthalmologist saying it doesn't look too serious. Follow up with opthalmology, they take more pix and then I have a sit-down with the opthalmologist, and she goes over my test results and then a bunch of health history questions. Have I ever done drugs, smoked, viagra, blood pressure meds; any recent illnesses? I told her about my flu-like symptoms (which I still had, but improving). Then she asked if I had a cat. "Um, yeah. 4 indoor, 4 outdoor, actually." Then the asked "Are any of them kittens?" "Yes, we adopted a kitten about 6 months ago." She ordered another set of tests, and the final diagnosis? I'm not making this up.
Bartonella henselae aka Cat scratch fever.