Vampirism
You would be hard pressed to find someone unfamiliar with the concept of the human bloodsuckers known as vampires. From Count Dracula to Carmilla, Lestat and Nosferatu and who knows what else, the fear of the vampire - a walking, animated, sapient corpse whose main goal is to drink your blood and who cares how they do it - has persisted through the centuries. Through different cultures, too. Thus, the various staples have popped up over time:
- Harmed by sunlight
- Harmed by fire
- Addiction to blood
- Pale countenance, corpse-like quality
- Lacking a heartbeat and other vital signs
- Allergic to fire, silver, crosses, lack of invitation, uncounted seeds, etc.
It has been known in select circles, in hushed tones among doctors, that patients have occasionally presented with an odd set of symptoms. They read, most often, as follows:
- Harmed by sunlight
- Harmed by fire (more than normal)
- Addiction to blood
- Inability to keep other food down for long
- Pale countenance, corpse-like quality
- Lacking a heartbeat and other vital signs!!!
Interestingly, an allergy to garlic is not among the common symptoms of this condition. And there has not yet been a single person discovered with an allergy to crosses, lack of invitation, or uncounted seeds. You can maybe say that certain types of anxiety or OCD act like mental allergies to these things, but we'll ignore that for now. We can discount the strange allergies - but it remains that all other "symptoms" of the cultural vampire are mirrored.
This condition remains extremely rare in the population (at least the US population - if you have info from international patients I would love to hear it), to the point where I'm unable to get an actual statistic. My experience of these people is completely anecdotal and I accept that that's not wholly scientific, but I am literally a girl in a basement, so I work with what I have. As always, this site and this information will improve the more people read it and give me their own experiences. It's collaborative. What I really need is a doctor who is willing to break a few confidentiality laws to get the truth out, but that would be a golden ticket, wouldn't it?
Anyway, though rare, it is definitely present. Some of the people I've spoken to are likely fakers hoping for attention, or people whose hypochondria has gone into insane overdrive... but some are truly legit. I recorded an interview with one genuine, bona fide case, which I am desperate to publish - but I am not lying when I tell you that people go missing for this kind of thing. I'll have to figure out a way of publishing it... subtly. Probably talking about it has already blown whatever subtle cover I had, so I might need to reconsider this page in general. ANYWAY. Some symptoms are explained away by other rare, yet known, conditions. Sensitivity to sunlight is documented, though I haven't read about a single mundane patient who experiences it to the degree I've seen. I'm talking second-degree burns. Some "medical cannibals" have popped up in both conspiracy and medical circles, who have to eat their meat so raw that it is dripping with blood. That's slightly different to what we have here. What we have is an addiction to blood, by itself, and a total intolerance towards anything else. No human can live on blood alone. No human.
I am left with a question, having been sufficiently convinced that vampires exist, though they're more just guys with a medical condition than the Draculas we're used to... these old tales of vampires, though. The Draculas I just mentioned. The Nosferatus. Do you think they came about because of this condition? Do you think people in ye olde times developed whatever this disease is, were shunned and staked and set ablaze, then written about as monsters?
I believe so. That makes it more important than ever that we don't let the same thing happen here. People with this condition are people, still human, and the Vampirism Syndrome does nothing to change that. There have always been ethical ways of getting blood. And what's a few more people taking the night shift?
If you believe you know someone with Vampirism, or even are someone with Vampirism... if you are a doctor... contact me. The only way we will figure this out is with more awareness and less fear. You know where to find me if you've found your way here already.
