Creating Congruity: Discovering physical, mental and spiritual harmony among a hectic life

Chapter 1: Welcome to Meeting Me

As promised I’m beginning a new blog series. In the past I’ve mainly stuck with light hearted topics so I decided to do a series that’s more personal and that will allow you to get to know me more on an emotional and personal level. As you all know for over two years I’ve been struggling with a pretty severe hormone imbalance. Honestly, it’s been hell. Like I’m not gonna sit here and put on a good front and pretend that it hasn’t been one of the hardest life storms I’ve ever had to walk through. This imbalance has not only shaken my physical & mental health but it’s put strains on my relationships, made me closed off and at times bitter. I mean imagine being trapped in a body that no matter what you do, it will not function the way it was created to. No matter how many hours you sweat, how much self control you practice you literally can’t lose one ounce of weight. Oh and the best part is, that instead of losing the weight you actually gain it. LIKE WHAT A FREAKING JOKE!

Saying that I’m salty or frustrated is a gross understatement. Honestly, I’m angry. Angry that there is absolutely NOTHING I can do to change this. Angry that my health situation has been exploited by doctors and moms caught up in pyramid schemes. Like this is SO MUCH BIGGER than essential oils and plexus supplements Karen!!! And I’m angry that this is happening to me. There are so many days that I wake up feeling like I’m just going through the motions and wondering “why me God?” I think “what have I done to deserve all this?” I’m just 26. I should be loving life and living it to the fullest but instead I’m a closed off hermit who honestly doesn’t want to go out and be around people. That’s not me. I’ve always been a social butterfly. I’ve always loved social events and being out of my comfort zone. At times this entire situation has made me into someone I do not like. 

I know I’ve started this whole thing off on a pretty negative note. You’re probably thinking “umm okayyy… this is awkward” and that’s fine. Things are gonna get awkward here during this blog sereies. I want this whole series to be 100% authentic. Social media is held together by smoke and mirrors. Let’s be real, NO ONE’S life looks the way it does through your phone screen. There’s a lot that goes into fooling you guys and I’m here to break those walls down. I want this to be raw and real. So before I get any further into this blog post I’m going to share my personal story on how I got here. Some of you have been OG Measure Me Whole followers and you know my story pretty well and some of you are new friends. Either way I urge you to read my story. Take it in, learn from my mistakes and if you have any questions write them down. Send them to me. I want to make this series as helpful and informative as I possibly can. I’m opening up about this to 1. Be super real with you and 2. To hopefully shed light on a taboo subject. Alright friends, grab yourself a cup of coffee and hunker down. Let’s do this.

Day one of contest prep. This picture was taken right after my first meeting with my coach. I was so motivated and ready to kill it.

For day’s now I’ve been trying to figure out where to even start my story. There are so many places that I could begin but I think it would help you fully understand my struggle if I started in January of 2016. I had been approached by a Graduate Assistant in my Nutrition & Food Science degree program. This girl was someone I admired and looked up to. She was a boss babe who was not only killing it in the fitness circle at our university, but she was career goals. She was one semester away from graduating with her Masters in Nutrition & Food Science and she was going to have her Registered Dietitians License. Like I literally wanted to be her. So now that you know that my friend crush on her was on another level you can see why when she approached me about working with her that I jumped on it, no questions asked. During a 4:30AM gym sesh, this dietetics god approached me and asked me if I wanted to be apart of her masters thesis. All I had to do was commit to competing in a figure competition that May, and allow her coach me through it. I don’t know if you know how expensive having a competition coach is but it can run you upwards of thousands of dollars. Of course I was not only extremely flattered that she approached little ole me but I was STOKED to be able to do something I’ve always wanted to do for a fraction of the price! 

We immediately got started. She informed me that over the next few months she wanted me to bulk up. According to her observations, I needed to gain a significant amount of muscle before I stepped onto the stage that May. She set my macros up and told me that I needed to eat A LOT of food in order to achieve what she wanted for me. I started this whole endeavor off at 115 lbs. I’m 5ft tall on the dot so 115 lbs for me was a good solid weight. I wasn’t too thin but still the tiniest I had ever been in my whole life. I had accomplished what I felt was an athletic build and I was happy with it. I was very satisfied at where my body was physically at and it had taken me years to get to a healthy weight. You see I grew up unhealthy and overweight so it was a HUGE accomplishment to be down to 115 lbs. From the time I graduated high school I worked super hard to get the weight off in a healthy manner. Three years later I had dropped 25 pounds and kept the weight off. 

I expressed to my coach that it frightened me to purposely put on weight because I had spent years getting it off. I had also expressed that my metabolism has always been on the slow side and that I would most likely need more time than most getting the weight back off before the show date. She brushed off my concerns and told me that she had things under control. “Just trust me girl. I got you.” There was "absolutely no need to worry” and with her reassurance we were off. From January through March my coach had me “bulking”. I wish I could say that it was fun but honestly I hated every second of it. I felt like I was eating WAY too much food for my body type. I would eat so much food that I made myself physically ill at times and I was gaining weight like crazy. The only physical benefit I could see is that I was incredibly strong in the gym. I mean I was a little 5ft beast. But honestly that doesn’t matter when you can’t fit into anything but sweatpants.

This was one of the only pictures I took during my bulk. I honestly was so self conscious at this time that I never wanted my picture taken. I was sitting right at 120lbs here. I eventually got up to 130lbs.

When the time came for me to cut I was starting things off at 130 lbs. YIKES! I had gained “only” 15 pounds but it honestly felt like 50 lbs on my tiny 5ft frame. I was panicking because I only had two months to get those 15 lbs off and history has shown that it takes my body a solid month or so to lose 5 measly pounds. My coach adjusted my calories and dropped my food intake to a more reasonable amount. At my checkin two weeks later she was surprised to see that I had only lost half a pound. She said no worries and adjusted my macros again this time dropping me into the 1,200 calorie range. Now I knew that 1,200 was EXTREMELY LOW. I had actually learned the week before in one of my nutritional science classes that its physically detrimental to place someone who wasn’t morbidly obese on a 1,200 calorie per day diet. Your body physically won’t function properly. I mentioned this to her and she brushed my concerns aside in an annoyed manner and basically told me that she was the one with the RD and that I don’t need to worry. At my next check in I dropped 5 pounds in 10 days. I was shocked and relived. I thought “great I’m making progress… whew” but my progress wasn’t good enough for my coach. She adjusted my calories again dropping me to 850 calories per day. Yup you read that right just eight hundred and fifty calories per day. I felt like I was dying. I was literally starving myself.

At my following check in I was down another 10 pounds. I dropped 15 pounds in the first month of my cut. I was sitting back at 115lbs and I felt like I was looking better than ever. But rest assured it wasn’t good enough. She wanted my body fat percentage to be below 10% body fat. So back to the chopping block I went and she slashed my calories down to 645 calories per day. I literally wanted to die. I was so weak and hungry. I remember eating a head or iceberg lettuce just to have something on my stomach. I was doing 2 hours of cardio per day on top of an hour of weight training and being a full time summer semester student. I was tired all the time, had sever brain fog, like I almost failed my summer classes that semester because I couldn’t mentally grasp the concepts in class. And I could hardly digest the little bit of food I ate. I became reliant on laxatives just to be able to go poop once a day (TMI but honestly everyone poops sooo).  It was horrible. Summer classes ended and by the grace of God I passed with all B’s (honestly still have no clue how I passed). It was time for my next check in with my coach but I hadn’t heard from her in over a week. I texted her and never heard back. I asked around and found out that she had turned in her thesis and that she had left the country to celebrate. I was devastated. How could she do this to me?!? I didn’t want to back out because I had not only dedicated SO MUCH time to this contest but I had also paid so much money to do this dang thing. $500 dollars went to cover my entry into the competition and my DFAC competitors card and another $300 was put into a custom made bikini for the show. 

Sterling and I going through my stage routine.

I began to panic because I had no clue what to do. My contest was three weeks away and I still needed to work on my posing routine and plan out my day of show routine. Thankfully I had the most amazing friend hear about what happened to me and she decided to dedicate her time and skills to helping me see this thing through. Sterling Henderson was a God-send. She came alongside me and not only helped me put together the most incredible posing routine but she loved and encouraged me through the rest of my training. She was a new mamma and yet she still found time to meet with me early on Saturdays or late in the evenings to work on posing. She was there for me the day of the show and made me feel like such a beast. Truly all the credit goes to her. I chatted with her about my how low my coach had set my calories. She was shocked at how little I was eating but unfortunately she said I needed to stick it out until the show day because any increase in my calories would cause me to gain weight. She suggested reverse dieting to get me back to a healthy caloric intake after the show was over. Finally show day was here and I weighed in at 100 pounds even and at 9% body fat.  The day was honesty such a blur. All I truly cared about was the pizza I was gonna eat after. I placed third out of 12 novice bikini competitors. I was shocked that I even placed at all. The biggest reward was the fact that the whole thing was over. That night I binge ate. I ate three pieces of pizza, an entire basket of chips and queso, two brown sugar cinnamon pow-tarts and a piece of white bread. I was like a crackhead in a cocaine factory. I ate myself sick and felt horrible the next day.

Post contest. I had just gotten done crying to my dad about how fat I felt. I was a complete basket case during this time.

I wish I could say that things went back to normal and I decided to never do another bodybuilding contest again but that would just be too easy. For months after my contest I experienced many different health issues. I was having severe gastrointestinal distress. I was still depended on laxatives for daily BM function. I had sever bloating after eating (literally anything I ate by belly distended like I was in my first trimester). I had severe anxiety, mood swings and cystic acne. I completely stopped having a period for months and I was a total basket case. I had only gained 10 pounds post contest (tbh I needed to gain the weight) and you would have thought I had gained 50. I acted like I was so fat. I even cried over it every time I would weigh myself. I had developed this horrible habit of weighing myself several times a day. I was OBSESSED with gaining weight to the point where I would hardly eat and do hours of cardio a day. I was a mess. I remember going shopping with my mom and crying in the dressing room because I thought I was fat when in reality all the clothes in the store were two sizes too big for my skeleton like frame. It was insane! It took my husband (boyfriend at the time) and my mom basically telling me that if I didn’t get some help that they were going to get me counseling. I finally went to an OBGYN and we discovered that my hormones were imbalanced. My estrogen was super high and my progesterone was super low. She told me that it was most likely due to me starving myself for so long. She prescribed me a low form of synthetic progesterone based birth control. Within three months things were back on track. I got back to a healthy 115lbs, I had a regular period and my acne had completely vanished. My digestion got itself back on track and I felt like me again! The only thing that I didn’t like about the birth control was that it did make me a little agitated at times but I would take that over the latter any day.

December 23, my wedding day.

I finished out college May 2017 happy, healthy and ready to take life by the horns. A few months after college graduation the love of my life got on one knee and asked me to be his bride and by that December we were Mr. & Mrs. May 6th through December 26th was literally the most magical time of my life. I was married and ready to start my new life with my best friend. Life couldn’t get any better. On Wednesday December 27th 2017 just four days after our wedding day, I went to my OBGYN to get an IUD. I had heard lots of great things about the IUD. I mean for starters it’s super convenient not having to worry about taking a pill. It also has a higher chance of pregnancy prevention than the regular ole pill. And here’s the kicker, it’s not supposed to make you gain weight! Honestly the last “pro” is the reason I wanted the IUD. The traditional pill had made my body carry around 5 extra pounds that I wouldn’t be sad to get rid of. No matter what I did those last few pesky pounds decided to stick to my belly and thighs and not budge. So I decided why the heck not and switched to the IUD. 

At my OBGYN appointment to get the IUD my doctor went over with me some things to expect after getting the IUD in place. She said for the first week I would be pretty swollen and bloated in my abdomen area. I would also have some spotting here and there for the first two weeks but after that things would be fine and I would be normal. Cool, great, let’s do this. Five minutes later I emerged from the outpatient room doubled over in pain from the worst cramps I’ve ever had in all of my life. Thankfully my sweet husband was there to drive me home. The pain was so terrible that there was no way I was going to be able to drive. We got home and I then proceeded to lay in the fetal position for the next 3 hours and slip in and out of consciousness. We had planned a family outing that day and I didn't want to let the IUD get in the way of that so I peeled myself off the couch, popped 4 Advil and headed out the door. The cramps I was having made me so nauseous that food was not an option. I just kept thinking, “suck it up this is temporary”. Oh man, was I wrong. Fast forward a month and the bloating that I was told I would experience was still there. I had been”spotting” on and off so much that I constantly had to wear liners in my underwear. And those cramps were still happening here and there. I called the OBGYN and they said that since I’m small my body might need more time to adjust. So I waited another month. 

It’s now February 2018. At this point I’ve gained 8 pounds and nothing I did would make the weight gain go away. I reverted back to old habits and begin to obsessively count calories and weigh myself every day. I was still bleeding… now almost daily. Some cool new side effects that started happening: I developed cystic acne, I started having strange allergic reactions to foods that I’ve never been allergic to before, constant headaches, sever mood swings, anxiety, depression, GI issues (like I didn’t poop ever), pain/cramping during and after sex, and my breasts had swollen up so bad that I had to buy new bras. I was an irrational, moody psycho who cried over puppy commercials and would throw hissy fits over the grocery store being out of the brand of almond milk I like. It was like someone else had inhabited my body and I just had to sit back and watch her totally destroy everything around her. I was miserable, depressed and totally not myself. 

At first I thought that it was all the change in my life that had me feeling this way. I mean I had gotten married on December 23rd and moved to Virginia five days later far away from all my family and friends back in Georgia. I knew absolutely no one except my husband and he was gone all the time for military training. Literally the day after we had gotten to Virginia he was gone for two weeks in the field and I was home alone. I had no job, no friends and the only place I knew was the one bedroom apartment we lived in. I was left alone with my never-ending thoughts in a place I didn't know. I was honestly in the darkest place I think I’ve ever been mentally. I’m not saying all of this for you to feel sorry for me or for attention. I honestly want those of you reading this to know that this experience was incredibly hard for me to go through but it was also extremely life altering. It’s shaped me in ways I didn't know I needed. 

Okay, get back on track Kaili. So February is about to come and go and I am still going through hell. I decided to do research and figure out what is going on with me. After days of searching I concluded that the IUD was the culprit. I decided that I needed this thing out of me NOW! I called every OBGYN in my area to see who would be available to get me in ASAP. I made an appointment and had the IUD removed the day before my husband and I had to move to Pensacola, FL for his flight school training. One five minute appointment later and I was a free woman. I felt SO relived! Brad and I packed up our U-Haul and made our way to Florida. As we drove away and I thought that it was so symbolic. Symbolic of me leaving that hell-hole and all that drama behind and moving onto better times. 

Life looked at me and with a villainous laugh rubbed its hands together and smiled a hellish grin because it knew that this was far from over. 24 hours later we had made it to Sunny Florida. As we unpacked, I hunted for my scale because I was eager to know if my weight had changed any (cause that’s and important measure of health right? *hard eye roll*). Eureka! I found it! I rushed to the bathroom, stripped down to my birthday suit and jumped on the scale. To my excitement my weight was down FIVE whole pounds! I did a little happy dance in the bathroom, got dressed and finished unpacking our house. I was just three pounds away from being back to my normal weight and I knew that it would be no problem. Just lots of clean healthy food and a little extra cardio would do the trick. WRONG! About two weeks after my victory dance in the bathroom my weight had shot back up. This time I was 12 pounds heavier. I started to panic. I quickly found an OBGYN in the area and went to see her. I attempted to tell her my entire story but she interrupted me said she’s seen this before and “diagnosed me” right then and there. No testing done, she just was that gifted that she knew right away what was wrong (I couldn’t roll my eyes any harder even if I tried). Fifteen minutes later I was leaving the doctors office with a prescription for birth control and sent on my way. I started taking the pill and boom I had a period. I thought things were going to be fixed. Lol, nope (getting tired yet? Yeah, me too). 

These pictures are extremely hard for me to share but as promised I am going to be 100% transparent with you all through this series. These were taken around march 2018 right after visiting my OBGYN in Florida for the second time. I had gained 12 pounds in a matter of two weeks.

I went back to the doctor, this time my visit was a whopping 5 minutes. She prescribed me another pill and with a pat on my back sent me on my way. She said if I needed anything to call and let her know. This might just be me but I feel like if there is something wrong with your patient you might need to listen to their whole story before assuming that you know what’s wrong… I don’t know just a thought. This pill did this really cool thing where it made me swell up really huge, like to the point where I had to buy new sports bras and wear extra stretchy pants cause none of my clothes fit (totally a Regina George moment). It also induced a period where I bled for 10 days straight. I was bleeding so bad I started to have blood clots the size of grapes and when I called the doctor no one answered. I left 3 voicemails and sent two emails. I finally quit taking the pill and my period stopped two days later. I got a call back from a nurse three days later and she said to quit taking the pill… wow great advice lady, thaaaanks. My doctor had told the nurse to have me schedule an ultrasound and to have blood work done. The ultrasound results results came back normal and the blood work showed that my progesterone was super low (history repeating itself). During my third visit to go over the results of my testing the doctor told me, and I kid you not that I was “probably being dramatic”. After all I had just gotten married and lots of people gain “a little happy weight”. REALLY!?! I had enough. I left upset and with another prescription for another pill. 

The dark state I had been in when I was in Virginia was creeping back. I could feel it breathing down my neck. I so badly wanted this to be OVER! I was desperate and was willing to try anything. I called my OBGYN back in Georgia just because she knew my patient history and I thought that maybe she could give me some advice. I spoke with a nurse and asked if she could have my doctor call me. Nothing. I even faxed her a letter and still nothing. I felt like I had exhausted all my resources. I didn't know what else to do. Fast forward to September and I’m at the gym doing my now normal two hour workout. I decided during an ungodly amount of cardio that I would listen to a podcast my dad had sent to me. It was about Chalene Johnson’s struggle with her health. Basically everything she was going through mirrored what I was dealing with. Chalene is a fitness junky who had always had no issues losing weight and staying fit and one day all of a sudden her entire world was turned upside down. She too had gone to doctors in search for answers with no solution. She eventually turned to an Integrative Medicine doctor for help. Long story short the medical help she received from the doctor helped get her body back to an efficient, properly functioning machine. That podcast got my wheels turning. I wanted that solution for myself. I googled Integrative Medicine doctors near me and researched the few doctors in my area. Eventually I found a doctor that peaked my interest. Let’s call him Dr. P.

I researched all about him to make sure he was legit and when I was satisfied with what I found I made an appointment. One week before my appointment I had to answer an extensive 400 questionnaire.  At my first appointment (that lasted over an hour btw) I explained my story in its entirety. Dr. P intently listened to my story and when I was finished he asked me lots of questions and went through the questionnaire with me. He said as he looked through the questions I answered many of my symptoms were consistent with Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome or PCOS. He said that he did not want to diagnose me until I had an extensive blood panel done. He also went on to tell me about why none of the hormones that my OBGYN would help me get back to normal. See the hormones we get from our traditional medical practitioners are all synthetic. Our bodies detect them as foreign substances so they don’t get utilized properly by our bodies. He also told me that synthetic hormones (bc pills, IUD, the patch, hormone shots, etc) can increase the risk of developing breast and cervical cancer as well as increasing our risk of having a stroke. I also learned that synthetic hormones are harvested from the urine of pregnant horses. I’m an animal over and so when I researched that more it broke my heart to find out how poorly the horses are treated. He advised me to no longer take any form of synthetic hormones and that after being off birth control for a month I was to have my blood drawn. He then did something that I hadn’t had a doctor do ever. He looked me in my eyes and said “I don’t want you to feel guilty or overwhelmed anymore. This is not your fault. This is biological and completely out of your hands. But this is fixable.” I felt relief wash over me. I was actually heard. Praise the Lord!

I quit taking the pill that day and my constant headaches were gone two days later. My weight also went down 6 pounds in 4 weeks, my acne cleared up and my mood was almost normal gain. I felt 80% better. I was halfway back to being me just by getting off of the pill! I had my blood drawn and two weeks later I went back to see Dr. P again. He went through my results with Brad and I and explained that I do not have PCOS but that my progesterone was extremely low. The normal range for progesterone in women is between 1.9-12.5 and my levels were at a 0.5. Since my progesterone is so low its not allowing other things within my body to operate properly. During this entire journey I have only had two periods. So in 11 months i’ve only had two mensural cycles thanks to my progesterone being so low. Low progesterone has also caused my thyroid to be lazy. It’s not allowing the hormones that signal for my thyroid to work thus slowing down my metabolism (i.e. the weight gain). And the biggest issues with low progesterone is that it causes infertility and it increases my risk for developing breast and cervical cancer tenfold. I was also told that due to constantly switching synthetic hormones and overworking myself in the gym that my results showed signs of internal inflammation. 

This is what I mean when I say that my bloat fluctuates. These pictures were taken one week apart with about 10 pounds of bloat between the two. My weight has literally fluctuated like this in and off for two years!

I was relieved to know that I did not have PCOS but concerned about having low progesterone and inflammation. Unfortunately treatment was not going to be covered by insurance so we were going to have to come up with $1,700 smack-a-roos on our own. Brad and I obviously decided to move forward with treatment because we were both ready for this to be over. Through the next three months I went through a trial and error process with my medications trying to figure out what dosage was going to work for my body the best. I had bloodwork done once a month until we my treatment plan ended. By the end of the three months Dr. P wanted me to stick with my current medication regimen for six months and then we would regroup after. He said that his wife/secretary Mrs. P contact me a month before my prescription ran out with orders to have more bloodwork done so we can evaluate where I am at and if any more adjustments needed to be made. 

The past few months I’ve been able to see positive changes. I can tell my mood has been evening out and my other symptoms are decreasing. I’ve lost weight, how much I honestly don’t know. I quit weighting myself almost a year ago. I can just see and feel that my body has been moving in the right direction. I had been having consistent monthly periods, my acne has been almost nonexistent. I thought that things must be coming to an end. Well over the last two months or so my body has been doing some strange things. I started having a period every fifteen days. I began experiencing severe cramps between periods, major bloating in my midsection and swollen breasts again. I’m not gonna lie my reactions have been so severe at times I’ve thought I was pregnant (I am most definitely not). These symptoms concerned both Brad and I that we decided that I needed to contact Dr. P. I had contacted his office Mid September to express my concerns as well to let them know about our move to Texas at the end of October. I called and sent emails both with no reply. After two weeks of waiting for a reply I decided to contact the pharmacy at the end of September to see how many more refills I had. My prescription refills were going to end mid October and to be honest I panicked a little because I still haven’t heard back from Dr. P’s office. On top of it all we are preparing for to move to our next duty station at the end of October so my time was limited. 

I asked the pharmacy if they wouldn’t mind contacting the doctor’s office to see what’s going on and they did. Miraculously I received a call from Mrs. P within hours of getting off the phone with the pharmacy. She said that my email had accidentally gotten sent to their junk mail (yeah okay). I basically restated everything in my voicemail and emails that I had sent and that I was willing to go have more bloodwork done in order to make any adjustments before our move. Side note: Brad and I both explained to the doctor and his wife that we were military and that we were going to be moving at some point in the near future. We explained that we did not want to move forward with treatment if us moving was going to be an issue and both the doctor and his wife assured us that we could continue care anywhere in the country. When I mentioned about the blood work Mrs. P interrupted me and told me that they were not going to be able to continue patient care since we were moving and I could not come in for any more visits (since they don’t file with insurance one visit is $300 btw). I asked her why this was the case and she didn’t even answer my question and just said that the doctor would refill my prescriptions for the next 30 days to give me enough time to find a new doctor in Texas. Before I could say anything else she wished me well and hung up the phone. That phone call made me feel so defeated and frustrated. How could this be? After all these years, all the money and time spent getting me mostly back to normal to have the rug yanked right out from under my feet. 

Current physique status. This is me now. I just adjusted my calories and i’m eating roughly 1,450 calories per day. This is still on the low side but I am trying to slowly add calories back into my diet and see what this does to my overall body composition and my hormones. Hoping this will strengthen me physically and help fuel my body properly in order for my hormones to balance back out.

Once Brad came home from work I tired to keep tears choked back while telling him all that had happened over the phone. If I’m being totally honest I completely lost it. Fear, anger and anxiousness washed over me and left me a crumpled up mess on the floor. I didn’t want all the progress I had made to reverse itself. Millions of questions swirled through my mind. What if I can’t find a doctor when we move? How much money is this going to cost us? What if I get sick all over again? Brad scooped me up, kissed my head and prayed over me. He reassured me that it was going to be okay and that we would find me another doctor. So after the initial shock ran its course we came up with a game plan. As soon as we get to Texas I’m going to find an OBGYN that’s covered under our insurance and go speak with him or her. I’m going to share every second of my story up until this point, uninterrupted and basically tell them what it’s taken to get me here. I’m not going to be told no and I’m sure as heck not going to be interrupted and or diagnosed without bloodwork done. And I’m going to take my prescriptions and show them exactly what I’m taking. I am willing to make adjustments to my current medication in terms of how many milligrams I am taking but I sure as heck will not going take anything different. I will not let myself be walked all over. 

That’s step one. Step two is what I’m doing with my food. Brad expressed to me that he thinks I was subconsciously cutting back my calories to an unhealthy level. Unfortunately my sweet, loving and very observant husband was correct. I had reverted back to old, unhealthy eating habits without even knowing it. I was eating roughly between 900 and 1,200 calories a day and we all know where that got me the last time. I honestly don’t know if these weird things are happening to my body due to my low caloric intake or if I just need a little more progesterone. Only bloodwork and time will tell. So for now, until I can see a doctor I am going to try my best to remain patient, pray, eat more and share my journey with you all. Thank you so much for taking the time to read my story. I hope that you will continue to follow along as I go through these next few weeks.

xo,

Kaili 

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