Health is Wealth

One year ago - exactly one year on April 27, 2012 - I was admitted into the ER because I was dying. I was severely malnourished. My parents drove me to the ER, not knowing what would happen. All they knew was that I was sick and needed help right away. I, on the other hand, was far from pleased. I was angry. How could they take me to the hospital? They hated me, didn't they? They were the worst parents in the world for abandoning me and making me go to the ER. I got into the ER and sat for about five minutes until I was admited. The nurse weighed me, and stared at the scale. When she told me my weight, I shrugged. So what? I knew that I was skinny. DUH! That was the whole point of starving myself. I was angry to be there. When I got admitted, I just thought that all it would take was a few days to eat, and then the hospital would let me go. Little did I know how much damage was going on inside of me. Blood work was taken, and my results were horrible. Sodium, potassium, and glu...

I have a LOT to write about: ED, life, feelings, stress, school, friends, God, nursing, health, etc. And thankfully, I love writing! I have been getting a lot of emails and comments about things that people want me to write about or to discuss on the blog. I wan to make sure that I get all the topics you are interested in. So, please leave a comment below with the topics or things that you want me to write about. I really do not care what it is about - I will try my best to make posts about all the topics you suggest. So, start suggesting! If you have any topics that you are interested in - about ED or not - leave a comment below. Ideas can include ED, stress, things about me, nursing, medicine, stress .... whatever! I hope this will help you, others, and myself. It is always great to learn something new! God bless all of you! And thanks again for all the support and love you all show. I am so blessed to have this place to share my thoughts and feelings, as well as so many wonder...

Life sometimes gets so hectic. We become trapped between all the things that we have to do, and it seems impossible that we will be able to finish everything. I hate feeling stressed. It is so draining, and I am not productive. I've learned some interesting things about stress during my studies...mainly, that stress has many negative impacts on our bodies and functioning. For example, stress releases cortisol, a hormone that breaks down our muscle to make energy from the protein. Too much cortisol can also causes memory loss, as well as suppress the immune system (so, it becomes easier to get sick). And there is so much more! I've realized that when I'm stressed, I cannot do much. I moan and compain about how crazy and difficult life is and how much I am struggling. I feel my body getting hot, my blood flowing faster, and a headache coming on (interestingly, these are the effects of epinephrine, another stress hormone). Soon enough, I'm so stressed that I became...

I have had a few people ask me about diabulimia. Interesingly enough, I have just completed a project about this topic, so I'm going to try to address it here. Because I do not have this problem, I am putting this on the spot now: I am not an expert about this topic. I am only addressing it here because people have asked me to do so. (See http://journals.lww.com/dccnjournal/Abstract/2009/07000/Diabulimia) Diabulimia comes from the words 'diabetes' and 'bulimia', but it basically refers to people with type 1 diabetes (autoimmune) who suffer from ED as well. They misuse their insulin by giving too little (or none at all) in order to lose weight. I empathize with people with this condition because it is really hard. Diabetes is a complciated condition that NEEDS to be treated, espeically type 1. These people NEED insulin to live because without it, their body cannot get enough nutrition. So, not using their insulin really does make them lose weight, but they also ...

This post is about why I DO NOT post information about my weight (numbers), food amounts, or pictures of myself. I have had many people ask me to do so, so I think now is a good time to explain why I do not do this. First, it will not benefit readers or myself to discuss my weight. My weight is restored, and that is all that is important. I am trying my best not to focus on the number because this just strengthens ED. For those of you who are suffering with ED and want to know my weight, I believe that this will only strengthen your ED as well. When I was very sick, I used to compare my weight with others who were sick. This only made ED more competitive, telling me that I was not thin and thus not as sick as other people - making me only sicker by the second. Now, the food. It is very hard for me to post about my food because I do not want to focus on it. I'm eating all my meals, and enough. But what I eat is different than what others will need, maybe I need less, or maybe I ...

I am not kidding when I say that I am nearly always full and never feel hungry. I literally never have the desire to eat; I never feel that I am in need of food ASAP. This seems strange to many people as they wonder how I can never have a desire to eat. Everyone gets hungry, they say. So, why do I not feel this way too? Does this have something to do with ED? Well, research can help explain some of this. Evidence shows that patients with AN (anorexia nervosa) tend to have different leptin levels than the normal population. Leptin is a hormone that makes us feel full or tells our brains that we have had enough to eat and are satisified. It just so happens that people with AN have abnormally high leptin levels. So, what this means is that they literally DO feel full all the time, or get full very easily.  See http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17060920  for details. So when I say that I am not hungry, it means that my brain and body actually do not feel hungry. My leptin lev...

When I first thought about the title for this post, I was worried that some readers would read it and think I was going to write about a mother pushing to deliver her baby! Nope, that is NOT what this is about! (Okay, now that we are done joking around, let's get a bit more serious...!) We all have times when we feel tired, hopeless, scared, worried and tired. You know those days when things just cannot get any worse? When there is simply too much to do, too little time, so many problems, a load of worries and challenges...the list goes on and on! I had a day like this recently. I had finished working on something only to discover that all my work had somehow been lost by my computer. I freaked out. I was so angry - all that work, gone to waste? WHY?! WHY ME?! It was so frustrating. I did not know what to do but cry, sob, and complain. I was furious. Thankfully, my mom and sister were by my side to provide support. They calmed me down and told me that although this was terr...