Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Trying to Crack the Code

Hello Friends. I'm here to give an update on my health. It may sound weird, but this is a huge change that has to happen at this moment, so I'm here to share and am looking for some support.
Back when I was in middle school I was diagnosed with anemia. Anemia is when you don't have enough red blood cells in your body/ low iron. Everything I ate tasted different. Some foods that I used to love started tasting nasty and vise versa. I was tired and weak all the time. I had to take these little red pills (iron pills) everyday for a long time until I was healthy again. Then, also in middle school, I got mono. NO FUN! I was tired, sick, weak, etc for two months. I also suffered from minor headaches all the time. Certain smells would trigger a headache including the bus and Bath and Body Works. Weird sounding I know, but even walking by these two things gave me an instant headache. I don't think I ever suffered from migraines, but who knows. Even though I was a very active child with dance, flute, choir, church activities (something EVERY NIGHT), I still got sick all the time.
Since then, I have had random times where I feel sick or weak, but nothing too bad. I still have headaches all the time and recently I'm starting to think they are migraines by the pain that they give me. I tried for a while to figure out what was triggering the headaches so that I could stop them, but I still havent been able to pin point what it is.
1. Maybe I need more caffeine? Nope
2. Maybe I need more water? Nope
3. Maybe I need to eat healthier? Nope
4. Maybe I need glasses? Still havent tried this one. I cant find a time where both Mr. Hunt and I can go together so that he can drive me home. He also needs to go to the eye doctor, so we are in a bind here.
So, the headaches still come and when they come now days, they come bad. I can hardly function.
So very recently, I have started to feel worse. I am ALWAYS tired. No matter how much sleep I try to get, I try to go to bed earlier, I try to take naps on the weekends etc, I'm still tired and weak. When I see other people my age with energy and going going going it makes me sad, because I physically cant.
I decided to go to the doctor to see if they could help. I thought maybe I had anemia again, or mono. Well, they took my blood and told me that I had reactivated mono. This is not contagious, but would explain why I was so tired and weak. There is no cure for this either but to just rest. Well honestly, besides work, that's all I do, and I cant really not work. This was during the all the wedding planning that I was told this so I was doing a little extra wedding activities on the weekends, but I couldn't just stop all that.
So fast forward to yesterday. I am still feeling sick. I never went back to the doctor to see if the mono went away, but they told me I really didn't need to go back. I am starting to have a headache almost everyday and it comes with nausea now. The nauseousness comes and goes. Nauseous for 10 minutes (real bad) and then fine for 30 minutes. by the way, NO I'M NOT PREGNANT! Ive already been asked this question when sharing my symptoms.
So here I am, taking things into my own hands. I am taking my mothers advice and I'm going gluten free. My mom did a little research awhile back because she was worried about me. I always call her when I'm feeling sick, so its been alot recently. She found out that people that have a gluten allergy will not really have symptoms at first, and then the symptoms get worse and worse as the days go. This would definitley explain why all of the sudden I'm nauseous and I feel like I'm getting more and more sick everyday. It also says that the symptoms are tired, weak, no energy along with others, but that is definitely me too. When she originally told me about this, I thought it would be too hard to do the gluten free diet so I brushed off the idea. Finally yesterday after complaining to Mr. Hunt about not feeling well, he said that we were starting the gluten free diet whether I liked it or not.
A guy at my work's wife just found out that she is allergic to gluten too and she is now feeling 10Xs better since changing her diet.
The only problem is, almost everything that I like has gluten in it. I'm a little nervous and don't really know where to start, but from eating a gluten free dinner last night and gluten free all day today, Ive been feeling GREAT! I know this is probably mind over matter at this point, because it probably doesn't work right away, but I'm optimistic.
Part of me wishes this is not it so that I can eat bread again, but I truly hope that this is it so that I can start to feel better and go on with my life. Right now I feel stuck and sad that I'm always sick. I promise I'm not making this stuff up like most people seem to think for some reason.
Sorry for rambling, but I just have to share. I don't really know what else to do at this point. If I find that after a month of the gluten free diet is not working, I will be coming to y'all for help!

Love,
Jennifer

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