About a year ago I started seeing this TikTok trend of moms "getting their pink back" and showing a before and after transformation. The before was usually an unhappy, tired, unhealthy version of themselves and the after was a vibrant, thriving woman. The tagline refers to the phenomenon of flamingo parents losing their vibrant pink color while they raise their babies because so much of the carotenoids in their diet that gives them their color is given to their chicks, and so their plumage turns a dull gray. Once the chicks are older and require less care, the flamingo parents "get their pink back" again.
I am just here to say: I see you, mama flamingo. I probably AM you. And the odd thing is, even though I consider myself extremely self-aware, I am just starting to notice what pink feels like again. Over the last year(ish) of my life I have traipsed an erratic, frustrating, agonizingly slow movement to take better care of myself. It all started with seemingly routine bloodwork 2 years ago, and it spiraled from there, mostly against my will. To be honest, if my friend hadn't made a call to his PCP pretending he was my assistant and made the first appointment for me, I'd probably still be napping on the couch.
It turns out that I had iron deficiency anemia, and I probably had it for years. I am a mother of 3, and I was anemic in pregnancy number two, and I doubt it actually ever came up to acceptable levels before the third little parasite started taking her share. On this side of things it is absurd to me that it never crossed my mind that something was wrong. I just thought "this is motherhood".
I'm tired because I don't get enough sleep. I haven't watched TV in a year because my eyes close as soon as I sit down, I love naps so this is normal. The kids wear me out; they're loud and fast and they take all of my energy. I have headaches because I need caffeine, or because there's particulate matter in the air, or it's another hormonal migraine. I'm out of breath climbing the stairs because I'm out of shape, I'm a lazy mom who can't even manage a 20 min workout. I fall asleep immediately at bedtime but have trouble sleeping through the night, it must be because I keep stealing naps during the day. I have heart palpitations, that's just a sign of getting old, there's a family history of heart disease. I'm always craving ice water, it's so delicious and refreshing! My hair is falling out in clumps, this shampoo is terrible, I need to spend money on the good stuff. Why are other moms always planning weekend activities to do with their kids!? They are so annoyingly extra, I hate that for them, there's nothing I'd rather be doing on the weekend than napping while the kids have unlimited screentime. My husband is always trying to plan something, he wants to go camping, or float down the river, or invite people over. He just doesn't get how much work everything is! It's never worth the extra work! Why does my out of town family plan something every month? Can't they get that making the 2.5 hour drive is impossible for me? Don't they understand how many times I've almost killed my family by falling asleep on the road? What is WRONG with everybody!
I'm ashamed to say that all these thoughts, and many other ridiculous ones, were a constant internal monologue. I literally believed all those, I even believed I was depressed but good at hiding it, before I realized that there was a fundamental amount of a certain mineral almost missing completely from my body. There were other bad things too; my triglycerides were high because I couldn't find the will to cook at home most evenings, so we ate out a lot. My A1C was also high. My Vitamin D was low (still working on that one), and honestly there was a slew of other things that feel like too much to list.
It took about a year of tiny changes and gross vitamins to get things going in the right direction. Birth control to stop my periods and preserve the tiny amount of iron I had left in me from sloshing down the toilet. More attention to what I was eating. Prioritizing long stretches of sleep above phone scrolling. As I write this out I'm thinking this probably would not have taken 2 years if I wasn't so terrible at doing the things.
I wanted to wait on this post until after I felt fully pink, but I'm coming to the realization that becoming pink is sort of like an uphill hike that ends only when you die. I actually wanted to sit here and vent about the mediocrities of the American healthcare system; the only less efficient machine that that is navigating our political one. Okay maybe we do have time for one tiny rant.
WHY DOES IT TAKE SO MANY APPOINTMENTS TO GET TO WHERE I NEED TO BE?
In 2024 the bulk of my medical care happened between October and December. I wish I could say it just happened by chance but it really happened because I procrastinate things and the end of the year was at hand. Do you know how many damn appointments I had to keep just to maintain things?! Let me pull up this calendar:
- Routine yearly PCP visit
- Follow-up appointment just to get blood drawn
- Secondary appointment just to get a sonogram (I have a hearnia that needs fixing)
- Tertiary appointment to go over blood work results and be prescribed necessary vitamins.
- Biannual dental visit for a cleaning (I floss, go me)
- Dental follow up #1 to re-do a very old filling (preventive maintenance)
- Dental follow up #2 to re-do a very old filling (on the other side of the mouth)
- Yearly OB visit for a pap smear and to get another year's worth of BC
- First ever visit to a dermatologist to see why tf I'm balding?
- Initial visit to a general surgeon to talk about the hernia he's supposed to fix
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