Life With Jenny: New Diagnoses

Oh my goodness; it's been a while, huh? Gosh, so much has happened since the last time I wrote. For those of you who have been anxiously waiting for my next post - here you go! For those of you who've given up on me (and who probably aren't here to read this, hahah), here you go!

So let's see, where to start. I've been diagnosed with Diabetic Peripheral Neuropathy. Let me start from the beginning. As I've said in previous posts, I have had type 1 diabetes for 30 years. Diabetes in itself causes complications and some happen no matter how good you take care of yourself. Diabetes is chronic and there is only so long the body can keep going on before some things fail. Diabetic Peripheral Neuropathy is one of those things. Controlling glucose levels can be difficult and over the years, the highs and lows wear on the body. In my case, specifically my nerves in my legs.

For last 4-5 years, I have experienced this incredible leg pain during exercise, or even long walks - even those vigorous walks through the grocery store because you're in a hurry - yep those would and still do cause me incredible leg pain. It's hard to describe the pain, it feels like my calf muscles would just ball up in a super tight knot and it would burn - oh my gosh the burning! The top of my foot where the foot meets the leg, if that makes sense, would burn so much and it would cause my foot to drop, like I couldn't pick up my feet anymore. It's terrible. Now, when I would experience this, I would complain about it and tell my family that I was in pain but I wouldn't go to the doctor for it. I didn't want to deal with whatever it was because I assumed it would be really bad. So, I stopped trying to go on long walks and hikes, I tried to make sure I didn't have to rush through the grocery store, I decided I could never be a runner, basically I just gave up a lot of stuff because I didn't want to feel the pain but I also didn't want to get it looked at. I felt like a doctor wouldn't believe me. That's probably because at the time I had been seeing military doctors and had been fighting with them to listen to me about something being wrong with my thyroid. So, I gave up things and just ignored/dealt with it.

A couple months ago, my legs were hurting and I hadn't been doing any exercise; they were just achy and it didn't feel right. Google is my friend so I of course started Googling things and then I thought about my family history, specifically my dad. My dad passed away at 41 years old from a heart attack. Google led me to Peripheral Artery Disease (PAD) and that can be connected to heart disease. Instant panic! The more I read, the more I was like, what if my dad had these kinds of leg pains and just ignored it too? He didn't like to go to the doctor, so what if he just dealt with it and then had no idea he had heart disease? Literally, I got on the patient portal with my doctors office and requested an appointment. Praise God, they got me in the next day. I went in to my appointment, I told my doctor all the things I was experiencing and thinking. After a thorough examination, she said I have Diabetic Peripheral Neuropathy, a complication of diabetes. Honestly, she said I've done good going this long as a diabetic and this is my first complication. This complication is treatable, but won't go away. It's with me until the end now, and will likely get worse with age. The pain could increase, I could lose all feeling in my feet.

Getting this diagnosis had me feeling all the feelings. I was glad I finally got checked out and have an answer to my pain, but I felt defeated. For whatever reason, I had this idea in my head that even though I have this chronic condition, the complications wouldn't happen to me. I would not be affected by any of the diabetic complications. I also grew up terrified of any of the complications from diabetes because it was drilled into my head when I was diagnosed that if I didn't take care of myself, this disease would kill me. It could cause me to have to have my leg(s) chopped off - that's the way it was told to me. I wish it would have been said more like amputations are a possibility with this disease. That probably wouldn't have been so traumatic. So imagine, you've been told these things all your life and knowing you have this incurable disease that can cause bad things to happen no matter how well you take care of yourself, imagine how you'd feel? I don't think I'm the only one that would have worked around it and ignored or avoided it. Because what if I went to the doctor and she said the worst; that I'd need to have my legs amputated?! So I'm sure fear held me back too.

I am glad I went to the doctor and got checked out. I'm glad it's not the worst thing possible. I'm glad I have medication to help with the pain. I do still feel defeated. I do feel like I failed somehow.

This appointment also led to my doctor sending me for a coronary angiogram - basically a CT of my heart. She wanted to make sure that my heart and arteries are looking okay considering my family history and my health history. This test gives results in a score format: 0-400. 0 is no indication of blocked arteries and 400 is like you should be in surgery right now. My score came back at 0! Praise God! Thank you, Lord. As of right now, my heart and arteries are healthy and I don't need to be concerned about dying from a heart attack.

Recent blood work came back with mildly elevated cholesterol, so I did start on a very low dose cholesterol medication really just as a precaution.

Now along with all of these things happening, my menstrual cycle's have been a MESS. I had a 25 day period. 25 days!! I've also avoided the gynecologist since after I had the girls too, because I was afraid that would also give me bad news. So it's been like 13 years since I had an annual gynecologist check up and screening. Because my period was acting way out of control, I was referred to one. She is amazing! I am so thankful she is my gynecologist. Good news - everything came back good, except for this one thing...

So, it turns out after getting an internal ultrasound, I have something called Adenomyosis. This is a condition where the lining of the uterus grows into the muscular walls of the uterus. It grows and sheds from the uterus and from the muscle tissue. Talk about pain. Why have I lived so much of my life in pain?! And why have I just dealt with it?! I will go more into Adenomyosis in my next post, but for now the quick information on it is what I said above, it also causes the uterus to be enlarged and bulky and causes SO MUCH PAIN!

Why does society think that it's normal for women to be in excruciating amounts of pain every month? Guess what? It's not normal. We shouldn't be in pain like that each month during our cycle. These societal norms are part of the reason I didn't make a bigger deal about my problems until now. Until I was like listen, something is wrong and I can't ignore it. It shouldn't be like this.

Thank you for being here on this journey with me. Thank you for your patience as I navigate the difficult things in life that leaves me without the capacity to write the way I'd like to. I'm trying to be patient with myself and understand that I am just one person who can only get so much done in one day. I have so many ideas and so many things I want to do, I guess I just need to pace myself and be patient with myself too.

Right now, I'm going to have a snack and maybe a nap #selfcare

Next post: Adenomyosis

Until next time...

xoxo, Jenny