As someone with a lot of health anxiety, it's always comforting in a way to watch videos like today's -- not because I want to see someone else suffer, but instead because it's sometimes good to know that you are not alone. That you are not the only one struggling to make sense of something or trying to tell yourself not to worry about something (because it's probably nothing -- right?).
It's still March 2007 here on Vlogbrothers Rewatch -- an ongoing series of articles documenting my long daily journey through the entire back catalog of uploads on the Vlogbrothers YouTube channel. Using this playlist, I am in the process of rewatching every original video in chronological order from the very beginning and sharing my thoughts on each one. I'm happy to have you on board, in whatever capacity that may look like.
This video contains several forms of foreshadowing, if you want to call it that. Comments pointed out that John's mention of eye cancer here eventually come back in the experiences of a character from his book The Fault In Our Stars. It's fun to see how a writer's thoughts and snippets of knowledge can eventually become part of a future story.
Which brings us to the second thing -- John's stress and anxiety around health and illness. He would later discover he lives with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and share that with the world. He would go on to fictionalize his experiences in his novel Turtles All the Way Down, about a teenage girl struggling to navigate the world with her OCD diagnosis.
His anxiety is palpable in this video, but it's also comforting to know that he is now taking much better care of himself through therapy, medication, and more. It is a lifelong condition that never gets "better" -- but it is possible to adopt ways to make that life easier.
Future John, you're doing alright.