3 Tactics For Managing Anxiety Attacks
Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the U.S., affecting over 40 million adults in the United States age 18 and older – 18.1% of the population – every year. I am one of them. If you have an anxiety disorder too, you are not alone. There are 3 main factors that helped […]
Top 2 Digital Medication Organizers
When I was 24, horribly ill and desperate for a diagnosis, I went to my doctor seeking answers. She was very kind and listened politely but said, “You’re actually quite healthy.” Dumbstruck, I asked how she had come to that conclusion after hearing my symptoms. She replied, “Well, you’re not on any medications.” I can […]
Motherhood With Chronic Illness: 7 Things I Wish I’d Known Beforehand
This will be my first Mother’s Day as a mom, and I am bursting with thoughts and feelings. So much work, energy, healing, and luck went into making this possible. I have been open about my journey of motherhood with chronic illness – my fears of not being able to conceive, but also of getting pregnant and […]
5 Tips for Navigating Chronic Illness With Executive Function Challenges
I taught for years in alternative schools and found that too often the students found themselves in my programs because their needs were simply not being met in school. For many, it was because they didn’t quite know what their needs even were. Some were on the cusp of a medical diagnosis, were working through […]
5 Reasons Why I Love My Sick Friends
Being sick is hard. There are many times when I look at my life, at all the joys I’ve had to forgo and the thankless work I put in to simply make it through the day, and I wish I could change it all. I wish I could have energy, that I could eat whatever […]
We Are Not One Dimensional
One of the best perks of working with other chronic patients is the authenticity of conversations that come up around the products we create. Nothing makes me feel so seen and valued like hearing my lived experience from someone else’s mouth! This struck me recently at a brainstorming session about Mighty Well’s newest product, the […]
Unpacking “Lifestyle Changes”
Last week, I wrote about the many practices, therapies, and medications that I consider “treatments.” While I believe in everything I included, I felt (to quote Clueless) an overwhelming sense of ickiness. I sat with it for a few days and came to the realization that I have a lot of emotions and baggage attached […]
Defining Treatment
My side project during this pandemic has been developing an app to help people with chronic illnesses make sense of their symptoms. In the app, you can track your symptoms, triggers, and treatments. One question I kept coming back to – what counts as a “treatment”? I think we typically limit our understanding of treatments […]
What is self care, really?
As a teacher, I’d heard the term thrown around quite a bit. We have a lot on our plates, so don’t forget about self care! Working with vulnerable populations is emotionally draining, so be sure to make time for self care! I remember one conference when I finally just asked, “ok, but what is self care though?” I felt […]
Compassion Fatigue
This morning, my breakfast was interrupted by a family member looking to vent to me about something that had kept him up all night. It was a topic I’d heard about on repeat for weeks. As I looked down at my half-eaten oatmeal, I found I didn’t have any patience or empathy for him. What […]
It’s Here: The Chronic Illness Revolution
As 2022 races out of the gate, I am feeling hopeful. For many reasons – some of which purposefully self-fabricated as I described on New Year’s – but one reason looms large in my mind: the chronic illness revolution is here. I feel like my entire life has been building to this moment. As a child, my […]
Approaching the New Year With Care
Boy, what a year. I distinctly remember this day, exactly one year ago, when I told my partner “Thank goodness 2022 is over! Here’s to a better year in 2023!” At the time, things were looking up – the wildest, scariest year of wildfires, pandemics, and world-wide chaos seemed to be winding down. I thought, […]