What can you do? Here are some helpful guidelines for action: ( copy and paste if you want to share on your page).
FWIW
Reposting very useful advice from a high-level staffer for a Senator:

You should NOT be bothering with online petitions or emailing.
Online contact basically gets immediately ignored, and letters pretty much get thrown in the trash unless you have a particularly strong emotional story – but even then it’s not worth the time it took you to craft that letter.
There are 2 things that all Democrats should be doing all the time right now, and they’re by far the most important things:

  1. The best thing you can do to be heard and get your congressperson to pay attention is to have face-to-face time – if they have townhalls, go to them. Go to their local offices. If you’re in DC, try to find a way to go to an event of theirs. Go to the “mobile offices” that their staff hold periodically (all these times are located on each congressperson’s website). When you go, ask questions. A lot of them. And push for answers. The louder and more vocal and present you can be at those the better.
  2. But, those in-person events don’t happen every day. So, the absolute most important thing that people should be doing every day is calling.
    You should make 6 calls a day (yup. SIX):
    2 each (DC office and your local office) to your 2 Senators & your 1 Representative.
    Calls are what all the congresspeople pay attention to. Every single day, the Senior Staff and the Senator get a report of the 3 most-called-about topics for that day at each of their offices (in DC and local offices), and exactly how many people said what about each of those topics. They’re also sorted by zip code and area code.
    And this is IMPORTANT:
    She said Republican callers generally outnumber Democrat callers 4-1, and when it’s a particular issue that single-issue-voters pay attention to (like gun control, or planned parenthood funding, etc…), it’s often closer to 11-1, and that has recently pushed Republican congressfolks on the fence to vote with the Republicans. In the last 8 years, Republicans have called, and Democrats have not.
    SO, WHEN YOU CALL:
    A) When calling the DC office, ask for the Staff member in charge of whatever you’re calling about (“Hi, I’d like to speak with the staffer in charge of Healthcare, please”). Local offices won’t always have specific ones, but they might. If you get transferred to that person, awesome. If you don’t, that’s ok – ask for their name, and then just keep talking to whoever answered the phone. Don’t leave a message (unless the office doesn’t pick up at all – then you can…but it’s better to talk to the staffer who first answered than leave a message for the specific staffer in charge of your topic).
    😎 Give them your zip code. They won’t always ask for it, but make sure you give it to them, so they can mark it down. Extra points if you live in a zip code that traditionally votes for them, since they’ll want to make sure they get/keep your vote.
    C) If you can make it personal, make it personal. “I voted for you in the last election and I’m worried/happy/whatever” or “I’m a teacher, and I am appalled by Betsy DeVos,” or “as a single mother” or “as a white, middle class woman,” or whatever.
    D) Pick 1-2 specific things per day to focus on. Don’t go down a whole list – they’re figuring out what 1-2 topics to mark you down for on their lists, so, focus on 1-2 per day. Ideally something that will be voted on/taken up in the next few days, but it doesn’t really matter…even if there’s not a vote coming up in the next week, call anyway. It’s important that they just keep getting calls.
    E) Be clear on what you want – “I’m disappointed that the Senator…” or “I want to thank the Senator for their vote on…” or “I want the Senator to know that voting in _ way is the wrong decision for our state because…” Don’t leave any ambiguity.
    F) They may get to know your voice/get sick of you – it doesn’t matter. The people answering the phones generally turn over every 6 weeks anyway, so even if they’re really sick of you, they’ll be gone in 6 weeks.
    From experience since the election: If you hate being on the phone & feel awkward, don’t worry…there are a bunch of scripts (Indivisible has some). After a few days of calling, it starts to feel a lot more natural. Put the 6 numbers in your phone all under Politician, which makes it really easy to tap down the list each day!
    Now go get ’em!
    ps – please COPY/PASTE/POST vs Share – it will be visible to more people – thanks.

Part II: Sehr Gut?

POST COLONOSCOPY DIAGNOSIS: MICROSCOPIC COLITIS: COLLAGENOUS vs. Lymphocytic (blah blah blah)

In the beginning….

Shivers! Thank you Ed. That was The Start. The Shivers…Every morning. 3am. Since? MONTHS. Going on years. Too long. Spring? Strange belly sounds. Rumbling. Unfamiliar twinges. Nausea. Anorexic gagging as I glance at dirty dishes in the sink prompting memories of yesterday’s smells of, well, food. My 3am private penance I don’t speak of. Not to anyone. Except you. Why would I. Talk of anything going on at that hour is immediately followed by a scowling reprimand of why anyone would be awake at such an hour. So…after making a cup of tea (you see my LOVE of coffee also abruptly concluded at that time) I would delve into research as to what disease was attacking me. Unequivocally, I had Cushing’s Disease. Next week – Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis. Not to mention ANY cancer that alluded to ‘nausea’ and chills. Yet, nothing ever made any sense. So I compensated. I donned sweatsuits before bed to combat the 3am shuddering. Purchased an electric blanket. Raised the thermostat to 71. And settled on worrying about it tomorrow. Convinced by early May that it was just my Spring allergies. You see that was Stage 1, when my symptoms were unclear. Yet devout. And, clearly dissipated as the long day progressed. Maybe It will go away. But this was just the beginning….

Amazing how one can self-diagnose especially if they know too much. Having recently spent time with a {young} family member dying of Ulcerative Colitis, I now realize that during that time (Spring) my symptoms were present. Shamefully, I admit, I used my energies of palliative care-giving as a poor excuse to NOT focus on my gastric issues. At one point, I seriously blamed a new supplement as the cause of a dreadful severe month long bout of (ugh- HATE THE WORD…another case of onomatopoeia) horrid grisly gruesome diarrhea. Whew! Said it. (D). I truly never bore myself with my crooked and preposterous thought processes. [OK: designated ‘bad guy’ were Horse Chestnut pills for Circulation].

Will save you all from the next 6 months. Let’s just say it was filled with pain, bathrooming, finding the right panty liner, bathrooming, drinking Gatorade, bathrooming, taking THE POWDER, eating bananas, bathrooming, taking THE POWDER, buying more Imodium, bathrooming, crying…. And on. And on. Where is this going? I actually rigged the tub to be a kind of ‘hospital’ bed to ‘save time’ (ugh).

FINALLY I find a smart, compassionate and EXPERIENCED Gastroenterologist to arrange all the testing and listen to my anecdotals with the guidance of 12 years of medical school training in the field and 20 years of practice. And NOT through the eyes of a tired, malnourished and crippled semi-retired nurse with stomach cramps, a diaper somehow attached to my ‘patient’ costume’ and a bottle of Gatorade in tow. Although crippled by symptoms so severe and scary – I prayed for a diagnosis no matter how serious. ANYTHING to feel better. Bring on the endoscopies/colonoscopies/Ultasounds/Specimen collections…MY apprehension has morphed to the GUTS I had and needed all along…

And now it’s ALL ABOUT ADJUSTMENTS. I am now as flexible as a sigmoidoscope, as long as it makes me BETTER… my worries now have a name. An etiology. A course of illness. A beginning. A middle. And an END. Most scholarly articles agree that although my diagnosis can be a life-changer, it rarely leads to serious illness requiring hospitalization.

You see, Collagenous Colitis and Lymphocytic Colitis are 2 types of microscopic colitis, meaning there is no sign of inflammation on the surface of the colon. Collagenous Colitis, which chose to infiltrate MY colon, is a type of microscopic colitis where a thick, nonelastic band of collagen develops under the lining of the colon, as explained by ScientistsTrusted Source. (Collagen is a type of structural protein in the body). Since the inflammation isn’t visible, a biopsy is necessary to make a diagnosis. A colonoscopy allows for biopsies to be acquired allowing for a microscopic view of my colon. The rest is now HISTORY as found in the charts of THEAthenaHealthCare.

And finally, although Collagenous Colitis symptoms can be uncomfortable and may lead to dehydration and sometimes more serious conditions…people can manage symptoms with medications and diet adjustments, such as the Low FODMAP Diet and avoiding known triggers such as alcohol and caffeine. My disease is not fatal. It is not a cancer precursor. And Yes!!! Symptoms are usually intermittent, meaning most people experience flare-ups for some time in between periods without symptoms. That’s a best case scenario and I’m taking it. There’s something just, well, so personal about GI diseases…private matters now become too real for you and to all around you. But you get used to it. It becomes less scary. And, It Could Be Worse! Could be shopping for ‘other’ kinds of medical supplies… those more ‘needy’. More ‘involved’. I’ll take my diagnosis and address as needed. Not bad. PLEASEREADTHIS🗽

GUTter Cleaning …near me

PART 1 GUTTERAL Dissonance

I always enjoyed the word “gut”. It is onamatapoetic. Funny thing…

as its synonyms, i.e., entrails, bowel, colon and innards are equally, well, repelling. A glossary of internal belly species. They were formerly benign designations. Now I fear them. Dislike them. Avoid them. They are now medical terms whose prophesy I no longer have the ‘guts’ to explore. I am a coward.

Let’s talk about guts. Not meaning “grit” nor “spunk”…the “guts” I’m talking about are, well, the anatomical connotation you were hoping I would overlook. Formerly, the discussion of digestive issues were second nature, a matter of course. For it necessarily implies FOOD and being surrounded by family ‘foodies’, it’s hard not to focus on the topic. Do you feel yourself coming around?

It wasn’t until the past year that I have been bombarded with gut issues. Being a nurse, of course, I am familiar with the intricate sequestered gastrointestinal structure and its common maladies. Large intestine, small intestine, reflux, stomach ulcers, gastroenteritis, hemorrhoids, etc. all of which are common terminology. We are all at least somewhat familiar with routine ailments involving these beloved body parts. Yet there’s so very much more. You will see. And the reasons for this interest? Although not the point right now…. Will save the efforts to solve my gory gut puzzle later, more specifically in PART II.

GUT-wrenching Connection

gut-wrench·ing ˈgət-ˌren-chiŋ: causing mental or emotional anguish

Ok. Here we go. You see everything we study physiologically has a pathway. And, the arrow goes both ways. Eugene Meyer III, Professor of Psychiatry and Medicine at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, states “The brain affects your gut. The gut affects your brain. A simple reciprocal interaction. The ‘microbiome’ (microorganism) which affects your gut, affects your brain. The brain affects your gut, which affects your ‘microbiome’.” The GUT-BRAIN CONNECTION.

You see there are trillions of bacteria, viruses, yeasts, protozoa, and fungi that inhabit our intestinal tract. Interruptions to this gut ‘microbiome’, for example, by a virus, bacteria or prohibited wheat or lactose can stimulate reactions in the body and, in turn, affect psychological, behavioral, and neurological well being. Backlash like the inflation of inflammatory cytokines (small proteins secreted by cells promoting healthy growth and development) have been incriminated in depression and anxiety. Who knew that consuming a probiotic could affect your mood? Your sleep? Your sense of well-being?

When you feel ‘butterflies’ in your stomach, this information emanates from your second brain. Concealed within the walls of the digestive system, this “brain in your gut” is steadily increasing our understanding of the correlations among digestion, mood, health and even your thinking. Contrary to the big brain in your skull, our gut ‘microbiome’ cannot compose a letter nor balance your checkbook. Its primary role is controlling digestion, from swallowing to nutrient absorption and finally elimination.

This new understanding of the Brain-Gut Connection can help us better understand the use and efficacy of IBS and bowel-disorder treatments such as antidepressants and therapies like cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and hypnotherapy. One must understand that these two brains consult. Work together. Talk to each other. In a way, gastroenterologists are like psychologists looking for ways to treat , heal and hopefully cure both ‘brains’. Clearly a new and challenging role to undertake. And clearly an indispensable task.

ROLE OF Neurotransmitters

Deemed our “second brain,” 70 percent of our immune system lives in our gut, which works hand in hand with our brain upstairs to send signals and directives, among a host of other functions, as noted in “Food For Thought with Kat | Mind-Gut Connection with Dr. Emeran Mayer”. Neurotransmitters produced in the brain control feelings and emotions. They are your body’s chemical messengers carrying messages from one nerve cell across a space to the next nerve, muscle or gland. They control the movement of your limbs, feel sensations and keep your heart pumping taking in and responding to all information your body is transmitting.

Many of these neurotransmitters are also originated and produced by your gut cells and the trillions of microbes living there. A large proportion of serotonin (a neurotransmitter that plays a large role in our mood, sleep and digestion) is produced in the gut. In turn, Gastroenterologists now know that perhaps prescribing appropriate psychiatric medications are warranted, i.e., antidepressants for IBS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome)—not because they doubt validity, but because these medications may target symptoms in some cases by acting on nerve cells in the gut. Talk Therapy, Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy, Yoga, Meditation, Group Counseling may also be additives in this mind-body model of effective healthcare.

These discoveries can assist in the understanding of why a higher-than-normal percentage of people with IBS and functional bowel problems develop depression and anxiety. “That’s important, because up to 30 to 40 percent of the population has functional bowel problems at some point.” https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/the-brain-gut-connection. It is easy to understand when imagining a marathon runner nervous at the start of a race needing to make a quick bathroom run. Or how a Thanksgiving feast can leave you feeling sluggish and tired.

OK. Time to start the necessary unpleasant yet life-saving ‘gutteral’ prep for my COLONOSCOPY tomorrow morning. The next step in actualizing a physiological rationale for why I feel so sick with unspeakable sequellae. Update imminent. PLEASEREADTHIS🗽