• My Latest Blog
  • Who Am I?

Original Cyn

A Journey Through Life

Join Me on My Journey

Join me as I explore all that life has to offer from food to adventures to my personal stories.
  • Be True To You!
  • Adventures
  • Culinary
  • Bucket List
  • Loving How You Look
  • A Little of This

Listen to Your Body

March 11, 2016 by originalcyn 1 Comment

Health FreepikA few years ago, my body was sending me subtle messages that something was wrong with it. When I asked my doctors about my unusually heavy monthly bleeding, it was chalked up to be stress related. I accepted that for many years because I thought that the doctors knew best.

In 2014 I developed a bad habit of eating ice. I thought it was just stress related as my Mom was sick in the hospital. It wasn’t until the habit got worse in 2015 did I do the research. Not only was I damaging my teeth but the craving and eating ice is a symptom of anemia. Without health insurance I felt like I had nowhere to turn so I attempted to deal with this myself by eating more iron rich foods.

By the end of the summer of 2015 my energy was dwindling when friendly advise sent me to give blood at the Red Cross. Why? The first thing they do is to test your hemoglobin to make sure you are a healthy candidate for giving blood. With a simple prick of my finger, I learned that I was on the verge of becoming severely anemic (For information on hemoglobin levels by the Red Cross, Click Here) . I started taking iron supplements and eating more iron rich foods.

I started to feel a bit better and thought I had this under control. In September I went to an OB/GYN for a follow up and asked about anemia and how it could be related to my heavy monthly visitor. Again, I was told that it was just stress. It was also recommended that I find ways to relieve the stress.

By late October, I stopped teaching belly dancing and was finding it difficult to hike with my backpack group. I was getting drained quickly. I tried more vitamins and eating better. At the end of November I took a holiday position loading box trucks. I thought regular exercise and proper eating would help me feel better, more energetic. By the end of January, I was sick and exhausted. I thought I had caught was going around work, it was just a head cold and it would pass in a week.

On Feb 2, I passed out on my kitchen floor. When I came to I was disoriented with fuzzy vision. Dave (my hubby-to-be) called 911 and an ambulance was sent.

My hemoglobin was 8.1 when I was admitted so they scheduled me for a blood transfusion. I also underwent a battery of tests to find the underlying reason I was seriously iron deficient. The OB/GYN on duty found a fibrous mass in my uterus, which was the cause for the heavy bleeding as well as enlarging my uterus. In nearly five years, she was the first person to give me a medical reason other than stress for all of this.

To regain my life’s activities, I had to take a seat and rest with little activity, take the right iron supplement (yes, there are different kinds) and hormonal medications to reduce the bleeding as well as eat healthier. It has been a struggle to set aside my favorite activities such as dancing, hiking and exercising. Even walking around the stores can be a struggle some days.

The good news is I know what is wrong and am working with my doctor to find the best plan to recovery as quickly as possible. I just can’t help but ask – what if the previous doctors had figured this out a few years ago? Would they be following the same course of action to clear up the underlying problem?

Unfortunately, my experience has been that many doctors treat the symptoms without truly knowing the underlying cause. Sometimes they are lucky and the person gets better. However, as in my case, things became worse.

Moral of the story:

If you think there is something wrong that your doctor is not addressing, please seek a second or third opinion. I can’t help but to think how much easier I would have it if only I had pushed the issue when I first started seeing the signs.

 

 

Filed Under: A Little of This, Be True To You!, Various Tagged With: choices, dance, dancing, Doctors, exercise, fitness, Health, healthcare, healthy, lifestyle, Love Yourself, Loving You, stress, unheathly, Woman, Women

Comments

  1. Lisa DiGuiseppe says
    March 12, 2016 at 2:02 am

    I’m happy you found someone to listen to you and help you. This is far to common for women in particular. What is being done about the mass in your uterus?

    Reply

Speak Your Mind Cancel reply

*

*

RSSTwitterFacebookLinkedinGooglePlus

Recent Posts

  • Some Favorite Summer Salads
  • For the Love of My Hands
  • From Grief to Peace
  • 2016 – A Year That Didn’t Go As Planned
  • The Joys and Lessons of Hiking

Tags

adventure Bathing Suits Bikini Body Shaming Bucket List Car Cars challenge choices Christmas Church Cleaner Culinary Distillery dream dreams Family food Friends Girl Girls Green half marathon Health healthy historic Holiday Memories Holidays journey Juice Juicing Love Yourself Loving You My First Car Pageant places running salad Silent Night snack spiced tea Traditions Whiskey Woman Women

Meta

  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.org

Return to top of page

Copyright © 2023 on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in