#psychiat

I was just an ordinary girl, living a normal if slightly boring life, until a cyclone of baffling symptoms descended upon me, and I was no longer able to function as a human being.

In a span of 20 years I was told I possibly had and was tested for: 

Recurrent sinusitis that required surgery, Multiple Sclerosis, Lupus, Hepatitis, Lyme Disease, kidney failure, liver failure, Leukemia, Cancer, Ovarian Cancer, Breast Cancer, Uterine Fibroids, Endometriosis, UTI, Bladder Cancer, Diabetes 1 & 2, STIs, Pelvic Inflammatory Disease, brain tumor, and a couple more that I can't remember right now. I ended up in emergency rooms four times with anaphylactoid and heart attack like symptoms and had two operations, one of which proved completely unnecessary. I was told I needed another six, which luckily I refused. I grew more and more alarmed with each negative result, believing for many years that I was in fact dying.

The first round hit when I moved to San Francisco in my teenage years. Offered the modeling contract of my dreams, I suddenly broke out in a rash all over my body. I was told it was acne and prescribed antibiotics. Then more antibiotics. Then the dizziness began. Frustrated doctors told me it was stress and prescribed medication. All my symptoms resolved upon leaving SF. It was obviously stress I told myself then - now the contract was off the table I was feeling ok. I missed out on the opportunity of a lifetime because my diet changed in SF from mainly organic salads, pasta and fresh fish to a daily diet of oysters, crab, shrimp and take out. All big NOs for Histaminosis sufferers. Ah well, too bad. And so I moved on. 

My symptoms continued to wax and wane before increasing in intensity. By college I was suffering from incapacitating dizziness, nausea, all over body rash, recurrent bladder infections (with negative cultures but I was prescribed antibiotics anyway), depression, anxiety, mania, loss of vision, palpitations, brain fog, a feeling of electricity running through my body, fibrocystic breasts and general breast pain, feeling of passing out every time I stood up, memory loss, vomiting, severe IBS and indigestion, heartburn, giant hives all over, recurrent sinus infections (with negative culture). But I somehow managed to get my degree and land a fairly high profile job while struggling through my symptoms. 

When doctors couldn't find anything wrong with me I was told I was suffering from anxiety and depression. After eight years or being used as a guinea pig for the psychiatric profession (14 meds and counting) I finally realised I was looking to the wrong people for salvation. I withdrew from four concurrent meds while under the care of the only sane mental health practitioner I've met.