I wish I were more creative with post titles! This one is appropriate but not very appealing to my soul.
I've decided to write about what I'm calling my 'health journey' the past couple years. It's boring, but I'm hoping to look back in a couple of years and smile that it's all over with.
After Henrik was born I was blessed with what's called a 'retained placenta'. Google it if you find it to be fascinating. It was not fun and actually was about as painful as labor. It went 3 weeks undiscovered, although I had a temperature when we left the hospital with Henrik. The doctor pulled it out in the office to avoid the need for a d & c, then gave me some high dose antibiotics. I made it 3 days before the antibiotics made me sick. The doctor said "no worries, you can quit taking them". Hind site is perfect; I now wish I'd asked for a blood cell count. I continued to bleed for 3 months and was told that was normal.
Skip to 3 months later: I was always sleeping and always sad. Brice went to the doctor with me and told him the symptoms. Doctor said "not likely you'd have a major depressive episode all the sudden, let's check your hormones". Okay, sounds fun.
First test came back. Doctor calls and says "doesn't seem right, let's redo them earlier in the morning". Sure, why not. Only $800 each time. Did the test again, still not right. Got scheduled to see an endocrinologist a month later.
By this time I'm back to work. Doctor had started me on a birth control pill hoping that would clear up the bleeding. We go to Ames to see the specialist. We spend more time filling out paperwork than anything. The specialist seemed nice. But, spent two minutes to say "you are nursing a baby and on the pill, I can't help you until both are done for at least three months". We decide it's not worth stopping nursing the new baby so we accept this news and wait it out.
Fast forward to April this year, about 8 months later. Things still suck. I'm asleep by 830, falling asleep with company here, oversleeping, struggling with leg weakness when I run. Things feel worse. Our labs that we are required to get yearly from our insurance state my triglycerides are 18 (very low). A friend who works in cardiology states "you need to get that checked out, it means malabsorption". Back to the doctor who basically says "you are a mom of 3, you work, you will be tired" and prescribes an antidepressant. So, I guess now he's decided I'm depressed, but last year that wasn't possible :) I had done my own research that cholesterol/triglycerides are necessary to produce hormones, but the doctor said he couldn't comment on that and sent me to another endocrinologist in Iowa city. I asked if he was sure the infection from the placenta was gone, and he said yes. I was having tendencies to wonder about that due to the 2 root canals and 2 sinus infections I'd suffered in the meantime.
So away we went again, but not until I'd seen my eye doctor to rule out pituitary involvement. There was another $200. Off to Iowa city, where we were told my chart would be thoroughly reviewed before our visit. It wasn't. I was told the labs I had abnormal, namely the hormones and cholesterol were probably ok because "those are based on 95 percent of the population; you may just be that 5 percent". They checked vitamin D and a thyroid marker and home we went. We were told there was nothing more they could do, but that we should see a rheumatologist to rule out multiple sclerosis and/or rheumatoid arthritis. Hmmm, really? Now I was feeling like everyone thought I was nuts and a hypochondriac and I was just going to get shoved around in the system. I gave up and started doing a few things on my own. Gluten free diet, essential oils, a 10 day cleanse, less running and more weight lifting. Tons of reading about our health, some changes we'd already implemented including butter and no margarine, coconut oil and no canola oil, making more homemade bread. Others need worked on but as I continue to educate myself thru 60 minutes a day of podcasts while I'm driving we'll keep implementing all natural changes. But even with everything I've tried it still hasn't gotten rid of the muscularity fatigue and occasional numbness in my hands.
So at the encouragement of a friend I looked up 'Functional medicine doctors'. I liked what I read and found a guy in Des Moines. In the meantime my bill for $849 arrived from Iowa city, all out of pocket as insurance put it all towards deductible. Hooray :) even better the guy in Des Moines is an all cash basis; so although the I was tempted to cancel due to the mounting expenses, I kept the appointment. I have lots of things I still want to accomplish and I need to fully enjoy these years with my young children instead of just existing each day. So I paid the initial lab and consult fee.
I saw him this past Tuesday. The labs had tested for 25 different things.
The main standout was a ferritin level of 9. Apparently that is the main storage form of iron in the body. It's 78 percent lower than it should be, whatever that means. Only 15 percent of my iron binding sites are occupied by iron. Apparently this has never been checked. When donating blood my hemoglobin has been good but that test isn't completely sensitive to iron. The other revelation was the presence of a bacterial infection. Not sure where of course, that necessitates more expensive testing :) the final standout was extremely low triglycerides and cholesterol. Meaning the presence of hypothyroidism, inflammation, or liver dysfunction. The combination of these things apparently means the presence of an autoimmune disorder. The likely culprit is a disease called "hashimotos thyroiditis". I asked all 3 doctors (my regular dr and both endocrinologists) about this and they refused to test for it because they only see it in heavyset people. It is possible it would stem from the retained placenta. It's possible it's totally unrelated.
Now I get to send my poop in to see if the infection is in my gut. I get to take lots of iron. I've been told this is called "iron deficiency anemia" and is different than just anemia where the hemoglobin is low. If the pills don't help I'll need infusions but the question at this time is why I'm not holding iron and where is it going. The doctor suggested a paleo diet to try to normalize the gut and minimize the effects of the autoimmunity.
So after a couple years and several thousand dollars later I don't feel so much like a crazy lady anymore but I do feel annoyed that it took so long to get answers. Anymore it's hard to even work in the medical field due to the poor success of conventional medicine. But everything for a reason. I've learned so much and hopefully the nutrition and chemical education I've gotten will help the kids and make us an even healthier household. I hope to get the iron up, feel better, and go back to the life where I didn't go to the doctor unless I was pregnant!
