June 2011
Having not had much luck with my primary care doctor in the past, my mom suggested I make an appointment with the APRN instead. After having my appointment I was very happy with APRN, she was much more personable, didn't make me feel rushed, and most importantly she listened to me. I explained to her how I had been feeling for the past 6 months and what I had tried to do to improve the symptoms. She asked me questions about any feelings of depression or stress (which I was happy to say I didn't feel at all) and I was really glad to hear her say that she didn't think it was stress related. Though I had a very stressful year, I had been done with classes and interning for 2 months, felt completely stress free, but was complaining that my symptoms were worse; had it been related to stress, they should have been improving. Because of this and the fact that I have a family history of both lupus and thyroid disease, she sent me to get some blood tests done for my sugar levels, my thyroid, lupus prescreening, Lyme's disease, and anemia. Though I feel tears come on at the thought of a needle and my stomach turns at the thought of a blood test, I was happy that she was taking these steps.
A week later I received the results of my blood work in the mail and had very mixed feelings about the results... everything came back normal. While that was great news for my health, I was very discouraged that I still felt like crap and had no answers.
After feeling frustrated and being back to square one I started to think maybe I was exaggerating, maybe I just need to get more sleep, maybe I just need to force myself to be more active...
A week later I decided I was not ready to give up. I called the doctor's office back and asked what they were going to do now. The way I was feeling was not OK, I wasn't exaggerating, and I was not willing to give up on searching for some answers, so I scheduled another appointment with the APRN...
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Saturday, January 1, 2011
The Beginning
January - June 2011
Being a full time masters student, working part-time, and interning part-time, upset stomachs and exhaustion became a normal part of my life considering everything I had going on and the amount of stress that came with it.
The first year of my grad program ended, summer was well on it's way, and I was feeling happier than I had felt in years, but I realized I still felt exhausted. I was only working part time at a stress-free job that I happened to love, so why was I still feeling like this? Summer was my time to go out and have fun with my friends yet I had no desire to do anything. In fact, the exhaustion seemed to get worse. I had a difficult time getting up and out of bed in the morning and I could barely make it until 2 o'clock in the afternoon without feeling the need to sleep. I also realized that although my stress was gone, my upset stomachs were still prevalent.
Knowing that something wasn't right I began to analyze the situation more. I did some googling in attempts to problem solve the situation and the first thing I came across was dehydration. Well I wasn't drinking nearly enough water as I should so I began to drink water more and more every day... I still felt exhausted and had upset stomachs and now I also had to pee all the time. Realizing that the water consumption was not helping I thought maybe I also needed to change my eating habits. I did my best to eat three good meals a day and have small heathy snacks in between but it still wasn't helping so I added in a daily multi vitamin... nothing... still exhausted with upset stomachs almost every day. So I finally decided to make an appointment with my primary care physician.
Being a full time masters student, working part-time, and interning part-time, upset stomachs and exhaustion became a normal part of my life considering everything I had going on and the amount of stress that came with it.
The first year of my grad program ended, summer was well on it's way, and I was feeling happier than I had felt in years, but I realized I still felt exhausted. I was only working part time at a stress-free job that I happened to love, so why was I still feeling like this? Summer was my time to go out and have fun with my friends yet I had no desire to do anything. In fact, the exhaustion seemed to get worse. I had a difficult time getting up and out of bed in the morning and I could barely make it until 2 o'clock in the afternoon without feeling the need to sleep. I also realized that although my stress was gone, my upset stomachs were still prevalent.
Knowing that something wasn't right I began to analyze the situation more. I did some googling in attempts to problem solve the situation and the first thing I came across was dehydration. Well I wasn't drinking nearly enough water as I should so I began to drink water more and more every day... I still felt exhausted and had upset stomachs and now I also had to pee all the time. Realizing that the water consumption was not helping I thought maybe I also needed to change my eating habits. I did my best to eat three good meals a day and have small heathy snacks in between but it still wasn't helping so I added in a daily multi vitamin... nothing... still exhausted with upset stomachs almost every day. So I finally decided to make an appointment with my primary care physician.
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