Thank you for all your kind words and prayers guys. I hope it's just an inflammation, like the doctor suspected. Nevertheless, thank you very much.
Beard.... I was exposed to TB when my mother had it, and it was here(Mid-Atlantic US), not in Russia that her's went active. She was initially exposed to it back in the USSR, but it remained dormant until years, maybe decades later. I do have the antibodies, as many people do. As rare as it is, TB is making a comeback in certain places. As far as the tests, I was given the chest x-ray because my PPD always came up positive, due to the exposure. Here too, whenever you enter school, or switch from one school to another, somebody usually has to sign off that you're TB negative. Aside from my mom, I've never heard of anyone in the states with TB. The concept of a TB sanatarium, in the US, is pretty alien, although I'm sure there's still one or two hiding in some forest somewhere.
No, I am not a smoker. I do have a couple very now and then when I go out drinking with my friends, but in the absence of that atmosphere, I don't touch them.
