I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving spent with family and friends. Besides the extreme amount of pain I’ve been in the last few days our Thanksgiving here in Garland, Texas was wonderful! I stuffed my face with plenty of absolutely delicious and way too fattening foods but hey that’s what the holidays are for!!
I thought I’d change things up a bit this morning and talk about some of my health struggles over the last few years. I haven’t gone much into my health here with you guys or what has come up recently but with things starting to pile up again, it can get to be quite a lot so I figured letting y’all in on some of my health struggles would be a good idea.
I’m sure you may be curious about the shoulder injury I briefly mentioned on Tuesday night. It’s kind of a long story but I’ll try to shorten it a bit. In 2019, I was in a drunken bar accident (I was completely sober lol) that ended up with me falling about three feet down onto concrete. I started treatment with three cortisone injections about 6 months apart each which didn’t work. After that I did weeks of physical therapy on it which didn’t work either. My doctor decided that we could try Shockwave Therapy if the PT didn’t work and so that’s what we did. We did an initial three sessions which worked beautifully! He told me that if I ended up having any more problems after those sessions I could call to come back in for an additional session if needed.
So last January (2021) I slept on a really bad bed for a week which sent my rotator cuff into a frenzy and I had to go back in for that extra session. Had I not slept on that shitty bed a little over a year after my initial Shockwave sessions I probably would have been fine. I’ve been doing good since then even though I still have to baby it certain ways to make sure it stays that way but happened to sleep on it very wrong the other night like I’d mentioned, lord knows with me that’s inevitable. I’m a crazy sleeper and as my luck would have it my right side is my fav🤣 So now I have to go back in for another session which I can’t wait for because I know it will help and get it back to it’s “normal” but at the same time I’m dreading the amount of pain I’ll be in for those 10-15 minutes.
That same summer I was finally diagnosed with PCOS which wasn’t a huge shock to me by any means. Then again none of my health concerns or diagnoses really shock me at this point anymore🤣🤣 A lot of people say that Polycystic Ovary Syndrome is a hormonal imbalance.. Which it is but it is actually an endocrine disorder at the end of the day. There are so many things that come with having PCOS including infertility, weight gain, excess hair growth, acne, irregular periods and of course the ovarian cysts. Plus more I didn’t list lol. Since I was diagnosed in 2019 I really just had a mild presentation which I was very grateful for.. Until September last year when I ended up having my first ovarian cyst rupture on September 9th and I will forever remember my first. I have never had kids and I don’t plan on having any, ever. But that pain I was in was what I imagine labor feeling like and my heart and ovaries certainly go out to all the mamas out there pushing those sweet lil miracles out because my poor ovaries truly felt like they were preparing to push a full on baby out. I was curled up screaming in so much pain on the phone with my parents who almost had to come get me and take me to the ER. I was able to get through the pain without going to the hospital but the severity of the pain and the amount of time I was in that excruciating pain for just completely wore my body out. I felt like I had been hit by an 18-wheeler and ended up having to rest in bed for almost a week. My second cyst ruptured a little over a month later on October 24th, 2021, two days before my birthday. My third one ruptured the day after Christmas that year and then my fourth ruptured March 26th of this year. Thankfully my ovaries have given me a break on the cysts rupturing but the PCOS definitely hasn’t let up. I’ve only had issues with severely irregular periods several times over the many years but it happened again not long ago. Thankfully I had went to my gynecologist recently and knew that if it happened again I would need to call to come in so that my doctor could make me have a period. I called on a Monday, they got me in the next day and I was able to start my 10 days of Progesterone which made my body have a period.
I swear my life is always eventful and there’s really never a dull moment around here! Come to the Pierce household!
That’s just a teeny tiny look into some of my health struggles. The seasonal allergies here in Texas always kick my ass every single year too even though I take over the counter allergy meds every day. This year has been particularly worse on that front sadly. On top of all that, my clumsy ass injured my driving foot last February right before Tyler passed. My first doctor thought it was just a bad sprain but by September 2021 I was not doing any better so I went and got a second opinion where I had an MRI done. I apparently had a chunk of cartilage missing from my ankle bone so my new doctor scheduled a micro fracture and debridement surgery for about a week and a half later. My aunt lent me her lovely scooter named Roscoe which was so so helpful because I was non weight bearing for the first three weeks, one of those of which I was in a soft/hard cast. After those three weeks non weight bearing I was in a boot for three more weeks, a walking brace for six weeks after that and then months of physical therapy. There are certain bones on the body that just aren’t the same after surgery. One of those being the ankle, lucky me! It’s still not the same, it looks like I have a large golf ball in my ankle and I can’t wear any of the same shoes anymore. I can’t rock climb or hike and I currently can’t stand, walk or drive for long periods of time.
There’s lots of things I can’t do right now and probably will never be able to do again. It’s something that constantly gets me down, more things get added to my “can’t do anymore” list and I feel like slowly the things I CAN do become less and less.
Oh and this past September I saw my new dermatologist for the first time as I’ve been having skin issues for quite some time now. I finally found somebody who listened after years of incorrect diagnoses and answers. As she looked at both areas of concern, putting the pieces of the puzzle together, she said it looked sort of similar to Psoriasis once she saw everything and had the full picture. I’m convinced that’s what it is and has been this whole time. Psoriasis can have flare ups triggered by stress and I definitely see a correlation between my Psoriasis getting worse and the amount of stress I’m feeling at that time. I have a whole nice and time consuming regimen with over the counter and medicated treatments to add onto everything else I deal with on a daily basis!
Everything I’ve talked about this morning is just a glimpse into my medical history. Over the 20 or so years since it all started it’s been one thing after another. I may get a small break here and there but for the most part it’s always something. It’s exhausting but Tyler gave my life meaning, he still does to this day and he is the reason I keep fighting every single day!
I hope this wasn’t too boring for you all today
Talk soon,
XO
Lauren
