January 1st, 2019… I started the year off running/ jogging my first 5K. It felt great and I set a goal to run the Houston Half-marathon next year. I started working really hard to make that happen. 16 days later, I was diagnosed with pneumonia. Yes, walking pneumonia. I hadn’t been sick, and I have never had any sort of respiratory issues. 7 days of doing nothing, no workouts, no work, no walks with the dog. I was barely able to leave the house. I had to be on an inhaler, antibiotics, and a steroid. I thought that with my follow-up visit, I would be in better shape. NOPE!
At my follow-up appointment, I was released to go back to work, but I needed to see two specialists, cardiologist and a pulmonary specialist. I was informed that I had developed exercise induced asthma, my phantom heart murmur (undetectable for the last 15 years) was present and louder than my actual heartbeat. The doctor went on to tell me that both conditions were likely due to my elevated blood pressure (it was fine the week before, what happened?). So I left with another prescription, and feeling like my body was betraying me.
February 8th, 2019, as I sit at church, trying to participate in the conversation, I feel my body begin to swell, my feet are twice their regular size, and I feel like I have a fishbowl on my head. My friend sitting next to me notices, and tells me I need to go to the ER. I sit through the remainder of the service, and I go home. My BP is about 160/115, I decide to lay down and go to sleep, maybe I can sleep it off. Maybe I was just stressed. Well the next morning, my blood pressure was even higher, so I end up in the ER. They run all kinds of tests and refer me to my doctor again because I was in no immediate cardiac danger… I’m not even sure what that means, I guess I wasn’t having a heart attack or stroke, so I was good enough to go home.
So I work on managing my stress, trying to get back in the gym, but somehow, I over do it and end up hurting my back. I spent a week babying a recurring problem. Toward the end of February, my monthly cycle comes like clockwork… but it doesn’t stop. So I google “long a$$” periods in so many words. One of the symptoms, PREGNANCY! Nope, how is that possible. It’s been nine years and I have PCOS. I can’t be pregnant. Yes I am! It was March 15th.
Immediately, I start to wrestle with all of the possible outcomes. I was 4 weeks pregnant when I found out, and made my mind up that it was in no one’s best interest for me to be a mom of 3. I am not mentally stable, I am not financially stable. I still live with my family. My kids are with my parents 5 days out of the week so that I can work. Well, over the course of the next 5 weeks. I tried to change my own mind, convince myself that I didn’t need to terminate the pregnancy, but then, my blood pressure spiked again. Higher than before. My blood pressure meds were not interacting with my being pregnant well. I was transported back to 2010 when I had to go on bed rest for hear arrhythmia. Yes, my heart was skipping beats so significant that I was hospitalized and couldn’t work. So now, as much as I wanted to keep the baby, I couldn’t put my own life at risk again. I can’t even get into the emotional piece of what those 5 weeks felt like, but for now, the pain of terminating my pregnancy was nothing compared to the emotional scar that will never heal. That was April 18th.
May 3rd, my Grandmother passes away. After fighting for nearly a month, she finally let go and went home to be with the Lord. She had peace. You can argue that this isn’t physical, but my heart broke that day. Losing my grandmother was the straw that broke the camels back. I wanted my baby back. I needed my Granny back. The pressure was something I could feel physically.
June 13th, 2019, was supposed to be a good day. Instead, I felt the weight of my anxiety and it triggered physical pain and a lost desire to move in any way. The heaviness of depression was sitting in my arms and legs and it hurt to move. I didn’t want to move.
June 28th, 2019, I was informed that my pap and biopsy revealed pre-cancerous cells in my cervix. After a couple more tests, the expectation is to have a procedure done to remove those cells. I couldn’t even listen to all of the risks, causes, etc because all I heard was early and cancerous. To some, its nothing big, but to me, it could go either way.
My 2019 body has not been good to my mind….
