- What up, it's your boy, Korndiddy.
I don't know, I'm sorry,
I regret everything that's happening.
(upbeat music)
Hey, guys, what's up, it's your little Jewish muffin, Zach.
If you're like, "What, the Try Guys have vlogs now?"
The answer is maybe.
(cheering)
Some weeks it'll be all of us together,
some weeks maybe me and Keith
will go do cute things together.
- You and I had twins?
- Oh.
This week, just me.
I like this, I can spin around.
(whooshing)
Which is really fun--
Oh, no, I'm getting dizzy.
Today's video is actually something that I've wanted to
talk to you guys about for a while.
A diagnosis that I just got.
It turns out I have an autoimmune disease.
It is something, and that's,
I know that sounds really, really fucking scary.
I guess I should start off by saying I am okay.
I mean, I guess I'm not okay, but I'm gonna be okay.
Maybe I should tell you the story.
So I have been suffering from something
as long as I've been making Try Guys videos.
No one has known.
You have not known.
The Try Guys did not know.
Not even really my parents.
Doctors didn't believe me.
As you may or may not know,
I think I've referenced it in some videos.
I have chronic back problems.
I had a lot of pain in my back.
Tightness here and every time I roll my neck, I get,
like, some pretty intense cracks.
I have had really bad back issues basically my entire life.
I was going to the chiropractor when I was 10.
I had to have an ergonomic backpack in middle school.
When I say I have an old man body,
I'm not really exaggerating, I hurt, I ache, I get stiff.
It kind of started before I went to Buzzfeed.
A lot of my time would be spent at a computer
and I noticed I would just,
when I sneezed, I could feel the pain shoot from my back,
through the front, through my chest cage.
It was like, basically, if my backs had boobs.
(groans) Are you fucking kidding me?
That's where it hurts me.
My friend Colin offered to do a yoga video.
The first time that I did yoga, well,
I have footage I can show you.
That's the craziest thing about working at Buzzfeed,
is that I have these chapters in my life
that I can go back and be like, "Let's go watch it."
Am I gonna be in pain tomorrow?
I feel like I'm gonna be in pain.
I feel like I'm just gonna be in constant pain
for the next two months.
The first day that I did it, it was like
I opened the portals to hell.
Day one of yoga.
My back hurts so much.
Like, so much.
And it was almost like the exercise was picking open a scab.
It was unveiling the pain that was underneath.
I have a bit of a hypochondria.
And so, whenever something's wrong with me, I'm like,
"Cancer, it's cancer, cancer."
So I told my doctor about this pain, he says,
"That's not a thing, you're good, you're good."
So I started going to a chiropractor.
I decided it was time to go to the chiropractor.
We took an X-ray, turns out I have fucking scoliosis.
That's when I discovered I had scoliosis.
- [Man] Scoliosis.
- [Zach] Right there, that's
- [Man] Scoliosis.
- For the first time, I can go back to the doctor's and say,
"Aha, I was right, look,
I have this slight curve in my back."
Now, for anyone who has scoliosis,
they will be the first people to tell you that
my scoliosis is minor.
It's not the kind you would get surgery for.
I tried a lot of things to help this.
I changed my diet.
I even got this really cool standing chair.
So, it's this really weird looking thing where you're, like,
leaning, it's like a leaning stool.
And it did actually help my lower back pain,
though, in reality, my friends just kind of turned it
into a toy more than anything.
Damn it.
- [Man] Oh, burn, 'cause Zach sucks at people, yeah.
- I still use that chair to this day.
- It makes a really good ottoman.
- No, that is not what this is for.
So, problem solved.
Not really.
The pain built to a point where I couldn't sleep.
I woke up, at like 4:45, in pain.
This was every night for, for months.
Laying down hurt,
being in my bed hurt,
I mean, living hurt.
I'm talking about, I would wake up
in the middle of the night five times.
All during this, I'm working a full-time job,
but when you're not sleeping, it eats away at you mentally.
I dreaded when the sun would set
because I knew that my pain was coming back.
(groans)
Now, throughout this process,
I told my doctor, told my chiropractor,
we had this kind of false diagnosis of the scoliosis,
but the scoliosis does not explain
the pain that I was going through.
I mean, not even close.
The amount that I had, I mean, it's like, boop.
It's nothing.
I had to start saying no to things in the Try Guys videos.
We did a wrestling episode and I said,
"Guys, I can't do that.
"I'm afraid that if I fall, I'm gonna be out."
I went to the doctor and I kind of
did a last, a final plead.
I said, "I can't stand this anymore."
I started screaming, I think, and I feel bad for the doctor
but I was like, "Hey, this can't continue.
"I'm losing my mind."
It's a terrible feeling to feel
like you know that something's wrong with you
and the professional who's assigned to help you
doesn't believe you.
I started questioning myself.
"Maybe the pain's in your head."
What a terrible thing, to doubt your own reality.
The story after this gets pretty quick.
I got referred to a rheumatologist
and within minutes, the rheumatologist is like,
"Oh, yeah, I think I know what's wrong with you."
And I'm like, "What?
"What? That's, what are you talking about?"
I had to go in for an MRI, which was scary.
'Cause at that point I didn't know what was wrong with me.
He just referred me to an MRI and I'm like,
"Oh, God, what is this, it's terrifying."
If you've never had an MRI, they tape your legs together
so you can't move.
So I'm in the parking lot and I can
hear the MRI machine above me.
This is the sound I was listening to
for the past 20 minutes.
Listen.
(electronic beeping)
It's really scary.
I'm staring at what, I guess, is a speaker.
For the life of me, it just looks like a shower head.
About this big and it's got the little dots going around it.
And you're staring at it, the buzzing starts.
And it's just repetitive, like
(mimics MRI machine)
And there's a person walking by me,
I feel weird.
I'm not used to vlogging,
I feel like a crazy person doing this.
No, he's riding a bike.
Good for him.
It turns out I have ankylosing spondylitis.
It is a real mouthful and super fun to say.
Ankylosing spondylitis
affects under one percent of the population.
As I understand it, basically, my body attacks the ligaments
in between my bones.
And then the body goes, "Ooh, I know, I can fix that!
"I'll put bone there."
But bone is not supposed to grow where bone isn't.
So I have bone growing where there shouldn't be bone.
That causes a lot of inflammation that causes a lot of pain.
My hips had begun to fuse together.
In between the gaps of my hips, there is bone growing.
Now, getting a diagnosis of an autoimmune disease
should be
one of the worst days of my life, right?
But, and I say this, honestly, I was so fucking relieved.
I really was, I mean, I wanted to cry of happiness
because getting that diagnosis was the difference between
being able to continue my life and not.
This was about four months ago.
I am happy to report that since that time,
I've been on medication and I have felt better
than I have felt since childhood.
I had no idea.
So, I take a drug called Humira,
so no matter where I am, no matter what I'm doing,
I have to stop what I'm doing and give myself a little shot.
- You ready to get poked?
- We hold on to Zach's medicine.
- I have to take this medication twice a month,
the same time.
So it's 8:40 a.m. and I gotta take this shot.
Have you guys seen this before?
Eugene, you've seen this, right?
- Yeah, I saw the first time you did it.
- Can we see it? - So this is my shot.
- Wow.
- [Keith] So you put that whole thing up your butt?
That's crazy.
- I really, I just grab the fat of my belly
and I have to do it in different places.
- Do you do it on your butt?
- I wish, I'm not allowed to.
It's pretty easy.
Take an alcohol swab, you know, just disinfect the area.
That was overkill.
- [Ned] Well, now your shirt's on it.
- Damn it.
And so, what's great is that
you never actually see the needle.
- Oh. - Right.
- That's nice.
- See this window right here?
Some of the liquid's gonna pop out of it.
- Whoa.
- Ow, ow, ow.
But that's it, now I'm done.
- And then now you put the rest of it in your butt?
How does this work? - Yeah, now.
Actually, yeah, would you mind?
- Yeah, I got you, bro, I'm good at this.
- What would you do if Keith wasn't here?
(groans)
- It hurts but no where near the pain that I was living with
every single day.
So let's wrap this up, what's the takeaway here?
If you are suffering, you deserve help,
and you deserve people to believe you,
and you need to go out there and get the care
that you deserve.
And if you're in a place where you have pains
that you can't explain or you know something is going on
but other people aren't believing you,
do not take no for an answer.
Because I took no for an answer for way too long
and I didn't have to.
- So what's this needle taste like?
Is it good?
- [Zach] I wouldn't lick it.
- Well, then how am I supposed to taste it?
- Oh, also, this is the most important question
I'll ask in the videos.
Try Guys fans, you are tryceratops.
Point of the homie, we all know that.
But, Zach fans, I'm liking Kornbuddies, Kornbabies,
those are some good options,
if you've got another one, let me know.
Gotta start the fandom.
All right, Kornbuddies, take it easy.
I'll see you later, bye!