2016 Recap and why I've been MIA A LOT!

**This post may have a couple of things you consider TMI, but it was real life so I shared it**

2016 was a hard year... I know it was a hard year for a lot of people and I don't think that my happenings were any worse than anyone else's. I do know though that it was the worst year for me. The first couple months of 2016 were like any other year for me. I was still quite new in my job so I was still learning how it worked and it was exciting and rewarding (and still is). I was adjusting to life in a New Year and had all these goals and plans that I wanted to achieve. Then March hit and basically since then my life has been flipped upside down! I first had my appendix removed, only to discover the pain was actually a cyst on my ovary. That was all good and well and I was coping and finding a solution for dealing with that and any pain that came because of it. 

My Doctor then ordered a bunch of blood work to do a routine check, as it hadn't been done in a while. This is when the real fun started. We started going through the pages of results. My iron was low basically anemic (this had never been an issue for me) so I was quite surprised, a few other things were off but nothing too alarming. Then we got to the kidney function...my kidney function was very low way too low for someone my age. He asked me if I noticed anything unusual when I urinated. I hadn't completely thought about it but since my appendix surgery my urine was an orange colour, I had thought this was just from the surgery and didn't think twice about it. This is why my iron was low I was passing blood in my urine more than someone usually would. 

I was then referred to a Nephrologist, where he told me that basically till you are 30 you should have 100% kidney function, after 30 it drops 1% per year. So from this at 31 I should have only had a kidney function at 99%, at this point and time my kidney function was at about 47%. We decided that I would have a biopsy on my kidneys so we could see what was causing the drop in kidney function. While waiting for the appointment my urine went from orange to basically red it looked like I was peeing straight blood!! I  finally went to the emergency room and was admitted to the hospital, they decided to do a rush biopsy so we could get me on some medication to get it under control. 

It turns out my kidney function was at 20% and I was diagnosed with something called IgA nephropathy. It is an auto immune disease you can read more about it here if you would like to know more. 

Of course being diagnosed with stage 4 kidney disease is a frightening thing, but I think the worst part of all of this was the medication. I had to take Prednisone which is a steroid that suppresses your immune system. (you can read more about it here). This medication has a TON of side effects, weight gain, shortness of breath, trouble thinking and mental health changes. These are just a few, and these few are some of the main ones I have had to deal with. Being on this medication I felt so tired or foggy. It affected my every day life, I couldn't remember every day tasks that I had been doing for years, I napped everyday sometimes even 2-3 times a day. 

I started out at 60mg of the prednisone, and was weaned off of it taking my last dose on New Years Eve. This was one of the greatest days of 2016 for me, because I knew it was the start of a New Year and I was going to remain positive and overcome all of the body and mental changes that the medication and being diagnosed with kidney disease gave me. 

So if you are wondering where I was the most of 2016, I spent the majority of it on my couch or in bed. I wanted to sleep most of it away for two reasons, I became depressed about the state of my life and also the medication made me extremely tired during the day and I slept like crap at night. I had no desire to socialize, I'd wake up everyday thinking about how I didn't want to be around any humans other than my husband. I no longer had the motivation to keep up with my blog even though I tried to force out a couple posts. 

With that said I have lots of plans for 2017 and have a new outlook on life stay tuned to hear about them...


-M