Welcome to the Wildflower Mama blog!

I first wrote about my toddler and her struggle with artificial dyes. This week, I want to share my own struggle: carbs. They sound more like an indulgence problem, right? Like eating too much chocolate in one sitting.

Here is the deal though.

Carbs were killing me and I didn’t even know it. Slowly, silently, and in ways I couldn’t ignore.

What’s the first thing we do when symptoms persist? We reach for medicine, right? Most of us do! I was taking nausea medication, Tylenol, bloat pills, and trying a revolving door of energy boosters. Not to mention the ADHD and anxiety/depression medications I took daily. Yes, you read that right, daily.

This wasn’t something that started recently, though some of the symptoms had become significantly worse.

Over the years, I tried eliminating different foods. For instance, when I cut out gluten, my daily, severe stomach pain after meals disappeared. I told people I likely had a slight gluten intolerance because I felt so much better. Now, I eat gluten in much smaller amounts, and those stomach pains haven’t returned. Unfortunately, I dealt with that pain for 10 or 11 years, from freshman year of high school to sometime between 2020 and 2021 when I worked with another woman who had celiac disease. Her story intrigued me to give it a try. She encouraged me and helped me learn about new options. My bloating also went away. I even won our office weight loss challenge! That still makes me laugh and was the best reward for the hard work I put in. Changing your diet is a huge challenge.

I had all the textbook symptoms. Below are symptoms and where they led me.

• Brain fog
• Trouble concentrating
• Irritibility
• Mood Swings
• Anxiety
• Rapid heartbeat (I thought it was due to anxiety)

These symptoms led to prescriptions for Adderall and an SSRI. I started taking SSRIs around 20 or 21. If one didn’t work, I was prescribed another in the same class. I encourage you to research the side effects of SSRIs; I’ll likely do a deep dive on them in a future post. By 29, I no longer wanted to take Zoloft, and I hated how Adderall made me feel, so I quit both. I could tell the Zoloft side effects were easing, but I wasn’t fully recovered.

Now for these symptoms I just chalked up to be related to low iron:

• Shaking
• Felt weak, like lifting my arms was hard.
• Fatigue
• Lightheaded

The fatigue and exhaustion were horrible. I would be exhausted even after a restful night, which was rare. It didn’t matter the circumstances; I COULD NOT wake up in the morning. It was so embarrassing not being able to get my kid to school and myself to work on time, but I would be sleeping so heavily or physically unable to wake up. It was as if I had taken NyQuil. I would fall in and out of sleep so much and never be able to fully wake up. There were mornings when I was so tired I would either call in to work because I would be late or not go at all because I couldn’t keep my eyes open long enough to drive. My daughter had missed school some days or was very late because of that several times. Other times, I wouldn’t sleep at all.

Other random symptoms I had that I couldn’t figure out:

• Always hungry
• Frequent headaches
• I started getting very confused or forgetful. I actually thought maybe my pregnancies had turned me into a full blown idiot.

The sleep was being a big deal. I actually thought “Oh my gosh Elizabeth, you are going through a psychosis episode.” I am having a hard time describing what it was like to not sleep. Like at all.

My husband thought it was stress induced. So after several months of talking and things getting worse I made some major life changes. I quit my job. Except none of my symptoms went away. Like at all. It was very disheartening when you think you are going to feel better and you don’t.

I decided to reach out to a licensed counselor and maybe discuss stress and some of the issues I was having from taking SSRIs. This was my second attempt to see a counselor. The first one told me I should ask my doctor about Xanax, and I never scheduled another appointment. I truly felt in my soul it wasn’t something popping a Xanax would fix! I told her everything. All these issues I was having, how daily I struggle with all the emotions, and I wasn’t sure if it was all related or if I was just a giant mess.

She paused. Then she asked if she could do an assessment on me. Of course, what could it hurt at this point?

She then proceeded to ask me I don’t even know how many, other than a lot of questions. I had to scale each question from 0, being not at all, to 3, being it affects me a lot. When she was done, she told me the “normal” range for these questions is 0-19. What she said next about took the air out of my lungs. I scored an 87. She then reminded me this was just an assessment and NOT a diagnosis.

She told me to research Reactive Hypoglycemia, and I was blown away. Reactive hypoglycemia is when your blood sugar drops a few hours after eating, often causing shakiness, dizziness, fatigue, or irritability. It’s usually triggered by high-carb meals that spike and then crash your blood sugar. My next Google search was “what are carbs.” Basically, I was eating carbs, and a lot of them, at every meal and snack. Almost all of my meals were carb-heavy, which was making my body release insulin to manage the sugar in my bloodstream. In reactive hypoglycemia, the body sometimes produces too much insulin, causing blood sugar to plummet. Every symptom listed above is attached to this.

Very rarely do I have time to see a doctor for myself. However, the next week after this visit, I went low carb. Some things I noticed were:

• My sleep improved, and I was waking up easier and not so groggy.
• My energy levels seemed to have boosted.
• After a few days, my need to lie down or nap around 2 p.m. went away.
• I felt happier.
• I also lost around 10 or so lbs in 1 week. Most of which was the muffin top. You can imagine how pleasing that is!

This week, I fell off the wagon some and feel pretty crappy. I am hoping to get my blood work done for my PCP either tomorrow or next week so we can discuss these findings.

Not everyone experiences these reactions, but it makes perfect sense to me. My husband could even tell I felt better and commented on it. He started eating the same way I was to help me stay motivated.

My biggest takeaway from this post is this: If you don’t feel 100%, don’t settle for what one doctor says. Make a list of your symptoms so you don’t forget to share them, and see several doctors. Get to the bottom of it so you can feel better. Life is too short to feel miserable. We only get one body; take care of it. Love yourself enough to make it happen.