Author: Carolyn Thomas

ChronicBabe: living a kick-ass life despite chronic illness

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 8 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas  ♥  @HeartSisters

I first heard about the work of patient/advocate/blogger Jenni Grover Prokopy (pictured at left*) years ago when, coincidentally, we were each named by Our Bodies Ourselves of Boston as two of their 2009 Women’s Health Heroes. She describes her blog ChronicBabe.com as all about how to live a kick-ass life in spite of living with one or more chronic illnesses. Jenni has an up-close and personal relationship with this topic. First diagnosed with fibromyalgia 20 years ago, Jenni was terrified. She felt completely alone – medical resources were scarce, and none of her peers could relate to what she was going through.

“My life was turned upside down. I went from being a hard-charging, super-athletic chick to feeling so fatigued I couldn’t walk more than a couple blocks. Severe pain kept me from pursuing career opportunities and social activities. And within a couple years, I was diagnosed with other chronic conditions, too. I thought my life was over.”

But it wasn’t over. She explains: “As a young woman with multiple chronic illnesses, I get you.”  Hold onto your hats, Heart Sisters – here’s my interview with the wonderful Jenni Grover Prokopy.      Continue reading “ChronicBabe: living a kick-ass life despite chronic illness” →

Don’t worry your pretty little head over your health care decisions

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 2 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas   ♥   @HeartSisters

My late mother, like many women of her generation, never even imagined telling her doctor that she wanted a second medical opinion, even if she suspected that her doctor’s treatment or advice was lacking. This means that my mother would rather die than get a second opinion. To ask for one would have been rude and insulting to her physician, and that could simply never ever happen.  Whatever her doctor said went unquestioned. He was the boss of her health care.

Many women today continue my mother’s preference for abdicating responsibility for one’s own healthcare. A study of women over 40 done by The Federation of Medical Women of Canada (called the LIPSTICK Survey) reported that only 10% of women surveyed knew their personal cardiac risk factors, versus 64% of women who know how much they weighed in high school.  Continue reading “Don’t worry your pretty little head over your health care decisions” →

How women can tell if they’re headed for a heart attack

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 25 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas  ♥ @HeartSisters

When Dr. Jean McSweeney from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences interviewed hundreds of heart attack survivors, she discovered something surprising: 95 percent of the women she interviewed actually suspected something was very wrong in the months leading up to their attack.

But even these early warning prodromal symptoms didn’t necessarily send women to the doctor, as reported in Dr. McSweeney’s study, published in the medical journal, Circulation.(1)  And for those women who did seek help, doctors often failed to identify their problems as being heart-related.
 Continue reading “How women can tell if they’re headed for a heart attack” →

The “loss of self” in chronic illness is what really hurts

~ Carolyn Thomas ~ 23 Comments

by Carolyn Thomas  ♥   @HeartSisters

People living with chronic illness already know that the triple whammy of ongoing physical symptoms, psychological distress and the discomfort of medical procedures can cause us to suffer. But when the late California sociologist Dr. Kathy Charmaz studied chronic illness, she identified an element of suffering that is often dismissed by health care providers.(1)

As she explained in research published in the journal Sociology of Health & Illness, a narrow medicalized view of suffering that’s defined as physical symptoms only ignores or minimizes the broader significance of suffering in a way that may resonate with you if you too live with a chronic illness like heart disease:    

Continue reading “The “loss of self” in chronic illness is what really hurts” →