I started using the LoseIt app again last week. This seems completely unfair to me, that I need to count my calories, because I run nearly every day. I should get to eat whatever I want!! Anytime I want!! But alas. That is the kind of logic that makes one need to get back to […]
An Anniversary of Questions.
June has come back around. It has been a year since I quite suddenly became unwell. I remember the night that it started – a Friday night – wide awake half the night, my lungs overcome with pain and feeling like they’d been deflated, my head dizzy and full of pressure, my heart beating faster […]
Why I Will Henceforth Dehydrate Myself in Public.
Caution: This story is so humiliating that I didn’t even tell it to my husband for several days. And it took me all of a month to come back and read it and decide whether I’d cringe too much to share it here. (I will, for the record, but alas. I am a blogger. And […]
56,000 Selfies: The Tale of a Capsule Endoscopy.
I like to stay on the cutting edge of technology, but I swallowed a camera because my doctor told me to. Also. I would like to clarify that my pinkie is not that crooked in real life. I caught it in the middle of a yoga move preparing to play its part in shoving a […]
Innerspace: The Story of my Colonoscopy.
Disclosure: By not closing out your browser window now, you are acknowledging and taking full responsibility for any mental or physical repercussions you may experience from reading the content contained herein. I’ve never noticed how much the line art in my blog background looks like intestines. Have you? So I had a colonoscopy and endoscopy […]
Goose-Chasing Dysautonomia.
Since I first got sick in June, I’ve been convinced that if Dr. House were real, he would totally take my case. Not because my illness is that much more interesting than anyone else’s, but because I’ve written 1,730 blog posts in the past six years – posts that surely have clues to help him […]
I’m not Crazy. My Mother Had Me Tested.
Spoiler: I won’t find out the results until Wednesday. Sometime after that point I’ll give y’all a full update. I got my head examined last week. It was a lovely procedure, really, shoving me into a capsule only slightly bigger than an extra-strength Tylenol and using experimentally psychosis-inducing cacophony to peek into the depths of […]
How Not to be a Doctor.
Dear New Doctor, Hi! I’m Rachel. You should know that, but since you didn’t read my chart, I guess you don’t. But I’m getting ahead of myself. I’ve been seeing a wonderful doctor all summer, but he wasn’t in the correct specialty to continue treating me. So, he referred me to you – for your […]
Sunset Therapy.
My summer sunset obsession has not been by accident. I don’t think I fully realized that until last Sunday night, when at the last minute, Chris asked me out on a date. I scrambled to find a babysitter for the kids and readily agreed – he seemed like he had a plan, and I do […]
Where I’ve Been This Summer.
My symptoms first started in June. For a couple of nights in a row, when laid down to go to sleep, I had chest pain, pressure that felt like my lungs were collapsing, and a lot of trouble breathing. Naturally, these symptoms also kept me from sleeping well. I first went to the Doc in […]