Sick Days

[M. (for now!)]

*Note: I'll be importing some blog posts from my personal blog to this site. I hope everyone finds them interesting and can relate!*

Lately, my immediate goal is to be able to stay out of bed for a full 8-10 hours straight. As it stands, I can barely stay awake throughout the day and even catching a taxi to one of my endless doctors’ appointments seems like an intense exertion.

Lately, the problem in achieving weight loss for me is not determination or will power; it’s illness. Even I have a hard time believing that for the past three years, I have struggled intensely with what begin as low-grade viral or bacterial infections. These tend to cause a buildup of mucus at the bottom of my throat, congestion, extremely uncomfortable fluctuation in body temperature, coughing, ear itchiness and extreme fatigue. All these symptons bring my blood sugar control down with them, causing intense and persistent hyperglycemia, which makes the infection worse (as it turns out, blood glucose and bacteria have an aggravatingly symbiotic relationship) and harder for antibiotics to completely eradicate.

Not only do the infections- as well as the constant antibiotic treatments- raise my blood sugars; they also keep me fatigued, absent from the gym, and taking entirely more insulin than I’d like to, which nearly negates my weight loss efforts.

But I haven’t given up yet. Forget the gym, or my aspirations to be a great athlete or slender young thing. Simply the ability to stay out of bed- and from the constant whirr of doctors’ offices- would be worth all (and any!) effort.

The relationship between my chronic infections and my terrible diabetic control (and weight gain) catalyzed my decision a few months ago to quit my social work job. By now, the mind-body connection has been well-established, and no physician or scientist will give you funny looks if you explain that stress has tremendous impact on your blood sugar levels. But I think that the impact of stress might be underemphasized in the medical and diabetic communities: where diabetes, compromised immunity and persistent sickness are the ingredients for a health bomb, stress is certainly the detonator.

So my work as a therapist at an all-male inpatient substance abuse clinic did no wonders for my physical condition, and by the time I quit, it was probably long past the time I needed to stop working and start focusing exclusively on my health. I’m fortunate in that my parents are able and willing to provide for me while I tackle my myriad of health issues. I wonder, with some panic, what people in my predicament would do if they had no financial backstop.

In addition to wondering how I manage my finances, people often ask if I’m getting bored and how I’m filling my days without employment. I tell them I’m a full-time patient, and I mean it. Take this work-week, for example: my Monday through Friday is filled with seven doctors’ appointments, and most doctors would like immediate follow-up with me and intensive records kept of my symptoms, blood sugars, insulin and medication intake. I spend my time en route to and from these appointments, trying to steel myself for the next round of paperwork I need to fill out for each new physician I see, correcting administrative mistakes made in billing my insurance, sending off checks to various health care providers, looking for stamps to mail said checks and- of course- constantly monitoring my sugars and weeding out the right medications from the apothecary that has formed on my nightstand. By the time the rest of the world is asleep and preparing for another day of work, I’m also asleep, hoping I’ll wake up the next morning with enough energy to continue to trundle along in my medical parade, searching for a cured infection, better sugar contro, better immunity, weight loss and vitality.

Wish me luck.