Mar 12, 2021Non-scale victory of the week!
So I'm writing this post as a way to vent a little. Kind of a way to mix telling someone and screami...
See moreNon-scale victory of the week!
So I'm writing this post as a way to vent a little. Kind of a way to mix telling someone and screaming into the void. And the screaming into the void part is important because I don't want most of the people in my life to know. I sound all dramatic, but it isn't anything crazy. Just super frustrating.
Food. We all have our own relationships with food. And then there is our relationship with food combined with other people. And our cultural food relationship. No matter how much of this journey is diet based, no one can deny food plays a huge role in all our lives. And my relationship with food just hit the rocks. Hard.
I've been having a health conundrum for the past couple years. I say conundrum because that is more accurate than "issue" or "problem." I'm itchy. It sounds so silly. And I NEVER would have paid it any attention except I started itching more. And more. Then one day I realized that any tight clothing, like the compression panty hose I had to wear at work, left marks on my skin. Marks that would raise into hives and itch like crazy within minutes after the pressure was removed. Soon it was any pressure. Draping the grocery bags up my arms so I could carry 8 bags in one trip? Hives up my arms. Dog scratches me when we're playing? A row of hives that look like a gift from Freddy Kruger. And the itching got worse by the day. And it was EVERYWHERE. Using the bathroom was a race to get done before I had hives in the shape of the toilet seat on my bottom. It was getting to be too much.
Finally I caved and went to the doctor. After first being told I was probably blowing it out of proportion and given a condescending pat on the head, I got in with a doctor who took me seriously. He couldn't help it. Instead of doing my best to be presentable, I went ahead and scratched anything that itched right before the appointment. Which meant I was COVERED in hives when I came in. Now the craziest part of these pressure hives is how fast they disappear. They appear in less than 60 seconds and are gone with no trace in 10 minutes. Completely baffled, my doctor put me on an antihistamine regimen and scheduled a follow up. And then...
This is where the pandemic comes into play. The reason I've been dealing with this mess for almost 2 years now. I actually had to call my doctor's office the morning of my follow up to tell them I was 100% sure I had COVID. The response was a bit demeaning. No one in my county had the virus. It was still mostly in China and Europe. The receptionist, annoyed that I was cancelling less than an hour before my appointment was quick to point out that I most likely had the flu. "Have you been directly exposed to someone who has tested positive for the virus?" Yes. She wasn't expecting that. I live in Michigan. Only a few cases had been reported and they were 100 miles from our town. But I'm not your average local. I'm an international flight attendant and I had recently returned from a 2 day training in New York. Where I sat next to a woman who had been on the last flight out of Italy before they closed the border a few days before. And she wasn't feeling well. Yeah she took out half our training group and they had to close the facility for a few months. When I explained this to the receptionist, her tune changed. She wasn't trying to be rude, apparently they'd had a lot of concerned coughers demanding to be tested and all came back negative. I was the first positive test in my town. The second in my county. (And I would like to note that I isolated well and fully and did not spread it to a single person in my town.)
Unsurprisingly, I was not rescheduled for an in-person appointment. After my COVID was gone, I was reduced to e-visits for nearly a year. I did have one in-person visit before they went online. They put me in their procedure room and the doctor sat as far away from me as possible. No vitals we taken and no one touched me. Everyone was masked. This was almost 2 months after I was released from isolation. They weren't taking any chances. There was a lot still unknown about the virus at the time.
It wasn't until just recently that I was allowed back in the building. They kept pushing the e-visits. But those were useless. So I just had my anti-histamines renewed and pretended it wasn't a bandaid.
Now here we are. I was due for an annual check-up and there was no way they could do that over the computer. When the itching came up, I explained that it was still a problem. The decision was made to send me for allergy testing. To an ENT. That will be relevant in a moment. I go to the ENT, he decides to do 2 different types of allergy tests. A chemical spot test (which I haven't had yet) and a blood test for common food allergies. I've never really been keen on the allergy issue because, being an international flight attendant, my life was incredibly varied. Until COVID grounded me. The last year being home has seemed a lot like the same day on repeat. But how could it be allergies when I ate different foods, drank different things, used different soaps and shampoos, slept on different sheets in places that used different detergents? It couldn't. Right?
So I was expecting the food allergy tests to be a non-starter. Maybe a blip or two like bananas and grapes. Foods I've had issues with in the past. I was NOT expecting the call I got. It turns out it might be allergies after all. Because I tested positive for allergies to almost EVERYTHING. To the point it freaked out the woman who had to call me with the results. To the point that my new Epi-pens got called in immediately. All 12 refills of them. It didn't matter that I was eating different things in different places. Because I was just trading one allergy for another.
So the ENT is still planning to do the spot test. Can't wait for THAT result. Probably allergic to air or something. And I'm left needed to upgrade to an actual allergist because there is no way I can leave this to a guy who specializes in tonsils and ear infections. Not to knock that. He took out my tonsils and checked me out after my ear drums ruptured on a Hawaii flight. But if I'm allergic to even HALF the things on the list he gave me, I need to see someone who lives and breathes allergies. Because that might me my new way of life.
So back around to the beginning. My relationship with food. My need to tell someone not in my life. Well it's all pretty screwed up isn't it? Obviously food and I are going to have to find a way to co-exist. But it won't be easy. I didn't list the allergies because the list is LONG. Imagine what you ate last week. Well pretty much all of that. Bread, potatoes, eggs, milk, peanuts, tomatoes, and on and on. So food for me is screwed. And eventually, when the world starts turning again, I'll have to deal with how it affects my relationship with other people and food. The people who will want to meet for lunch or offer me some of whatever they have. People I work with who wonder why I never eat anything on the plane but carrots. And then, if I explain, people might treat me differently. I know they will. I know how many went bonkers when I went vegetarian and were always worried if a restaurant would have something for me. Or making sure they had something at their house if I came over. Like being vegetarian was akin to being delicate and allergic to normal. And now I really might be allergic to normal.
Well this rambled on and on. But I got it out. And now I can move on. There will be much bitching and moaning from here on out.
How many days did you exercise last week?
7
How would you rate your diet last week?
4
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