Chronic Illness: The Invisible Disease That Has Changed My Life Part l

This will be one of my more vulnerable posts, but that’s why it’s under personal right? 

For those of you who do not know, I endure chronic illness and chronic pain. All autoimmune diseases fall under the category of chronic illness. I am one of 5-8% of people who suffer with autoimmune diseases. That sounds like not a lot but looking at it by the amount of people versus percentage it’s roughly 23.5 million Americans.

Ironically my entire family endures the trials of having an autoimmune disease, well everyone except for my dad (lucky). Which if you look at the statistics, it is more common for multiple family members to have an autoimmune disease rather than just one person in that family. An autoimmune disease ‘label’ engulfs more than 100 chronic illnesses where the body attacks itself. 

• Sojern’s disease
• Lupus
• Rheumatoid arthritis 
• Hashimoto
• Type 1 diabetes
• Vitiligo
• Celiac disease
• Addison’s disease
• Multiple sclerosis

There are more than 100 of these chronic illnesses that people endure every day and most of them are invisible so no one even knows. Since the vast majority of these diseases are invisible; I want to share my story because it could help even just one person not feel so alone in their journey. With that. . .let’s begin!

Around September of 2022, I began experiencing mild symptoms. This included; extreme fatigue, hair loss (like more than the ordinary female), extreme thirst, swelling ankles, and I was HOT (all the time). Now, I am the girl that loves to be wrapped up in a blanket 24/7 to feel cozy, but that was not happening. 

In October, I met with my OBGYN for my annual visit. I asked her if she could do some bloodwork because I just didn’t feel like myself and something was up. She completed bloodwork and I was later told I had hypothyroidism and needed to begin taking Levothyroxine in November. I’m not going to go into the gory details but I was having significant um…bowel…issues. 

I went home to Alabama for Christmas and while visiting I repeated labs because it had been 6 weeks and I was told this needed to be done. I was told by the doctor in Alabama that I was put on an extremely high dose of the medication and it needed to be lowered. So, that doctor lowered the dose. (This is where it gets tricky)

In February, my husband and I flew to Omaha, Nebraska to have our wedding ceremony and reception. I was throwing up THE ENTIRE TIME. The morning of, I threw up my favorite breakfast (chocolate gravy and biscuits, if you haven’t had it let me know. I can send you the best recipe). The next morning, we left for our honeymoon; flying to Miami, Florida for a cruise. 

I threw up multiple times a day every day on our cruise. Yes, the fear of being pregnant occurred and yes I spent about $30 for ONE pregnancy test on the cruise ship. Spoiler -💥that wasn’t the case💥.

I made an appointment with my Gynecologist as soon as we got back to have labs done again. My dose of Levothyroxine was too low🙂. So she increased it. I still threw up. She lowered it. I still threw up. Turns out I’m allergic to Levothyroxine, so I’m no longer on that! 👍🏼 

I was taken off Levothyroxine around April/May of 2023. I still didn’t feel “normal” and began having different symptoms. What I didn’t know at the time was I would never feel “normal” again.

Come back for part ll 🫶🏼

Or don’t🙄