Monday, April 30, 2018

Spring 2018 Update: Return to Cape Cod

Hello family and friends! It has been way too long since I've updated you all on what's going on in my life, and I'm sorry about that. Some of you know what I've been up to but I realize that many of you don't, so here is a quick recap of my life since leaving Crater Lake last fall. 

I wish I could say that it was all good things, but unfortunately that's not the case. I returned to Florida at the end of October to stay with my mom for the winter and worked for UPS and the liquor store like I had the previous winter. I also decided to use the time of relative calm in my life to focus on addressing some health problems that had been going on for about a year. I don't remember how much of this I've talked about on the blog in the past, but for those of you who don't know, about a year and a half ago I was diagnosed with an autoimmune thyroid disorder called Hashimoto's Thyroiditis. Basically my immune system thinks that the cells of my thyroid gland are foreign invaders, so it mistakenly attacks them, leading to destruction of the gland and continuously decreasing thyroid hormone levels in the body. This diagnosis led me down a path of wanting to know what else might be going on, and I subsequently found out that many other hormones in my body are out of balance, I'm gluten intolerant (most likely Celiac) along with various other digestive complaints, have positive antibodies for several viruses my body has been fighting off, and I might have Lyme Disease, and could have had it most of my life. That was quite a shock to me, since I've never had any major symptoms that would lead me to suspect Lyme at all. However, this slew of diagnoses made me examine how I was really feeling and I realized that it had been a while since I'd felt 100% healthy. I just kept pushing through life, ignoring symptoms or thinking that it was normal. Everyone complains about being tired or having random aches and pains, so it didn't seem like a big deal until it was brought to my attention just how much my body had to handle.