Well, a surprising amount of people read the blog about Tessa’s health in September, and many of you ask how it’s going, so I figured I should write an update to give you an upload of the uptilt in the trajectory of this upheaval in our lives. The quick version is we found a new guy who upset Tess with his verbal uppercuts. We’ve since upgraded to a more uplifting doctor who feels she can get us on an upward trend. I’ll give more details though so you don’t get upset and I don’t get upbraided. I’m now out of up words.
So, I even ended the last blog with a mention of “if you know anyone who can put all these results together, let me know…” one of the main issues some of the tests say is generically that her methylation cycle is off, so Tess did some research and found a guy who supposedly specialized in methylation. We went to see him and we brought all our results in hopes he’d be able to put it together. He started off well enough, he basically said “before we look at all of those, can you tell me about the symptoms of what’s going on?” so Tess did, and then when the conversation led to talking about test results so far he said something akin to “yeah you didn’t need to take any of that, you wasted your time” and it rubbed Tess wrong. In general she felt like he came across too condescending and was too focused on his pet topics of what everyone needs (more iron, must sleep in exact time window of the day, etc) and she just didn’t like him. I thought he wasn’t terrible, but he admittedly didn’t seem to be grasping the bigger picture.
We tried his supplement suggestions for a few months, didn’t see any change/improvement, and went back in November after taking an auto-immune test. There was one slight marker and he said he could prescribe a long term pain killer (way to fix it!) I was like “isn’t that a bandaid though? What’s the real fix?” and he said “well, you could try the AIP diet” which basically cuts every food you’ve ever heard anyone being allergic to. He said we could take a food allergen test, but it’d be like $190. Tess started saying no, but I didn’t want to start some crazy diet without knowing if it even needed to be done. She looked uncomfortable about the money being spent, but I’m a big strong man who provides for my wife! So I said we should do it! And we DID!
Break time for a pro-tip. If you want to do something, and your spouse is on the verge of tears, rather than assuming you know why and bulling forward anyway, I highly recommend not doing whatever it is, and talking first. Tess burst into tears on the way out of the office, and the workers were all trying to smother her, which of course isn’t helpful. We talked in the car on the way home and it wasn’t the money (oops) it was more that she’d rather deal with the physical discomfort than with the guilt felt whenever she wanted to eat a food she would now know she’s allergic too. Also she just spent months making a 8 week rotating meal plan that would be totally shot. So me bulling forward with the test was definitely unwise and not very sensitive of me. I'm of the "the more data the better!" opinion. But forcing the same perspective on Tess was not very empathetic or husbandly of me.
Anyway, gratefully when we got the panel back we found she’s allergic to almost literally nothing. She was 0 on like 43 categories and a 1 of 8 on blueberries or something random. Despite that Tess was done with that doctor anyway. Mentioning the idea of scheduling with him again was an easy way to make her instantly stressed.
I encouraged Tess to pick a new doctor before we stopped seeing the current one, because I’m fine not seeing any specific person, but I do want to keep momentum of trying something. So Tess found a MD turned naturopathic doctor that her dentist (who got us started on this path anyway) recommended. This new doctor’s online registration stuff took 2 hours to fill out, and Tess wrote a 7 page essay about her medical history and the journey so far. She also uploaded the blood work and genetic tests and in general everything we’ve done up to this point.
Our first visit we were admittedly pessimistic, we fully expected her to have not read anything, and jump on her first pet topic. But to our surprise she’d read everything! Even the 7 page essay! She then proceeded to take two hours with us and go over all the tests we’d taken so far, and put each meaningful detail into a category of what might be causing it. Ie Stress, toxins, foods, infections. Based on all of it she recommended a few supplement tweaks, and thought that it’s likely a liver problem of some sort. She recommended a bunch more tests to help verify her ideas.
When we came back the second time, she had already printed out the new test results, and written the previous test result values so we could see what changed and by how much and what that means and… anyway the point is she was very comprehensive and seems to really be looking at the picture as a whole rather than just focusing on one detail and diving a mile deep into it. Although she does have her pet topic of going gluten free that she's brought up 3 times now, even though Tess has taken two separate tests that both say she's not sensitive to gluten at all. Despite continuing to mention that she does actually action on the data at hand, so we don't mind her pet topic :D.
We’re now 2+ months out from the last visit, and we’re going to re-measure a bunch of the things the doc tried to supplement, and go see her about the results early April. That being said, it has basically had no positive impact so far. Tess is still generally lethargic, and what would usually be meaningless amounts of physical exertion still take a way bigger toll than they reasonably should. So it’s still a struggle and a search. Tess felt extra crappy some days even and wrote a message to the doctor describing the new discomfort she felt, and the doctor responded telling us this is expected and to hold the course. So that's what we're doing!
However! After reading the last blog it seems like most people thought it meant Tess is just lying in bed aching and crying all day and has no happiness. Note that we still have wonderful fun times together playing board games and watching shows and having people over and so on. Life hasn’t stopped completely. But! We’re happy to be included in your prayers ;).
Thanks for all your support, especially our awesome neighborhood who does SO much for us! I really couldn’t be a home owner without all of you.
Ok bye!
