Baring all three years on..

This is an important blog for me i'm now three years down the line from when my swelling first became apparent, so near enough three years since my diagnosis of nephrotic syndrome. These three years for me have entailed 7 relapses and not a single day off pred since this whole thing started and although I'm feeling far more confident and aware of whats going on with my kidneys it doesn't take away from the fact three years later I'm sat faced with the dark green dipstick once again.

Anyway rather than dwell on negatives I thought i'd take this opportunity to look at what effects three years of NS has had on my body and promote body positivity among all of us, as after all we all go through the same things as one another and we should never feel like we are going through this alone. So I'm going to root through the old photos to show how much nephrotic has changed me, but how that is something I will never be ashamed of.  

1. Moon face.

We all know the effect of steroids on face shape and being 18 at the time of my face totally developing into a scone,  It was not the best for my confidence. I used to pull silly faces all the time to hide how I felt, but now after less prelonged periods on high steroids I'm finally feeling like myself again (gonna use some photos to show just how scone like my face became)

2. Hair thinning. 

 You can also see in the picture how thin my hair became, at one point I was losing massive clumps at once it was horrible, I ended up getting clip in extensions to make myself feel more back to normal. Wanted to include this as I've seen a lot of people talking about it on the Facebook pages and just wanted to say it does, well it did in my case get back to normal. My hair is now back to its usual mane like state. 

3. Mood swings. 

Pred mood swings are nothing to be embarrassed about, I know this is something I've really really struggled with throughout these three years. Ive always been an anxious person but steroids seem to have brought the worst out of me, to the point when I was really struggling I didn't know or like who I had become. The closest people to me also got used to how to help me and knew that if I was having a bad time it would and could pass as quickly as it had come. Also I still have my times when steroids seriously effect me i'm getting used to understanding what they do to my emotions and even recently got my tattoo to remind me its worth the fight no matter how down you feel some days. 

4. Stretch marks. 

For anyone who has read my blog before they will know that my scars from all my losing and gaining weight and thinning of the skin due to steroids are something i feel passionately should be looked at as something that shows strength and not seen by so many as ugly and unwanted. For a very long time I hated my scars, I was scared of what people thought and lost confidence even in front of my boyfriend. But now i've learnt although they are fading they are with me for life and I might as well learn to love them. So in the spirt of sharing my experiences heres a picture of me, scars and all- so if you have got scars like me remember there are loads of us like it and it's your body thats fighting this illness too and thats pretty amazing.

I hope this slightly exposing blog (sorry for all the pictures) might have helped highlight some the shared weird and wonderful experiences NS causes and explained to anyone else out there why sometimes we are a little different.