I’ve not talked yet about the other chronic diseases I have. I’ve had Type I diabetes now for nearly 20 years. And I have almost died three times due to undiagnosed and untreated Lyme Disease. It took me years to get both of these diseases under control and well balanced. Currently, I have no signs of infection due to Lyme Disease and my diabetes is well under control and I keep my A1C at near normal levels. That is until I was diagnosed and started treatment for Lipedema a few months ago,
The more compression equipment I get for my lipedema, the more I have to learn how to balance it without it effecting my other chronic diseases.
Since Lipedema causes a lot of accumulated lymphatic fluids in the body. The compression therapy helps bring it out of the malformed fatty tissue and back into the blood stream. When that fluid enters the blood stream, my body tend to see it as toxic fluid, nasty waste that must be pushed out. Bodies tend to react adversely and become stressed with that much extra toxicity. That translates to bodies working harder just to maintain health.
For me that means higher blood sugar and tiredness from both the blood sugar and Lyme Disease trying to reactive itself.
Through the encouragement of my Iipedema therapist and my physician, I am learning how to balance my compresssion.
It has taken a lot of trail and error, I’m learning how much compression my body can tolerate before it goes bonkers. I am learning I need to balance what type of compression I wear at one time, and how long I wear it.
One of the things I’m learning to do now is Manual Lymph Drainage (MLD). If you don’t know anything about Lymphatic Massage, you can check out this YouTube video for Self Manual Lymph Drainage of the Leg from Michigan State University.
MLD is wonderful stuff because it helps the body get rid of all this waste. It’s powerful, too, as I found out the first time I had it done to me. I was sick for days because too much was released at once.
Do you have multiple chronic conditions? How do you balance it all?
Cee's Chronic Illness Sisterhood 
It really is a balancing act. Feels as if one part of me settles down only to see another flare. And so it goes
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… and so it goes. Progress seems slow at times, but when I compare where I am right now, from when I started. I feel like I am light years ahead. 😀 Hang in there V.J. all is well. 😀
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So true. Measuring progress helps immensely.
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Yes it does. 😀
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Reblogged this on Cee's Photo Challenges and commented:
My latest post on Cee’s Lipedema Sisterhood website.
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It isn’t easy to fight chronic illness Cee, good to see, that you are in the right direction 🙂
I hope to be able to keep mine down best possible. Stopped 2 months ago with some strong medications and already now, I have much more energy. This should become even better than now, I hope so.
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Chronic illnesses want to creep back and become active and in our faces. I’m learning the balancing act so I can actually make some headway. I glad you are making some headway as well. Keep me up to date on your wonderful progress or frustrations.
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Thank you and I will.
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So much in life seems to be trial and error, I call it learning the hard way and it seems to be the way for most. It’s what makes bthe success we experience mean something, I suppose. Glad to hear you are making strides to feeling better.
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We learn through experience, I guess that is what I’m trying to say. You put it together nicely. 😀
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