Laura Veen Baldus

I'm 43 (almost 44) and have been a diabetic for 8 years and had a stroke six years ago caused by a hole in my heart. My weight has increased since my husband died almost 4 years ago, but I was heavy to begin with. I started this journey after some very hard years trying to build my life back from my husband's unexpected heart attack and death. I had a lot of struggles - I lost my job twice since my husband died because of effects from my stroke, I was homeless with my two high school daughters a couple times, and I've had two cars completely die on me - my only source of transportation to my job and my only hope to stay afloat. There were times I did not know if I could make it through. I questioned who I am as a human being and at times felt like the hill was too high to climb. But somehow kept plugging my way forward.
 
In March 2015, my doctor (after many times cajoling and trying yet another pill) put me on injectables. Very expensive injectables. They made me sick to my stomach and essentially stopped my colon from operating but once a week. It was not good and had only a minimal impact on my blood sugar. But the worst part about it was that I had always wanted to be free of injectables. I wanted to somehow control my diabetes through diet and exercise. But the years have been too hard to control a lot of the variables that enable people to be healthy and stay healthy. Luckily, my life has been very stable for a year and a half through a very, very good job and resolutions of my car situation. My daughters and I have a stable home and so last spring, I decided to move forward with bariatric surgery to defeat - once and for all - the horrible, life-crippling DIABETES!
 
Along this road I discovered I have EE - eosinophilic esophagitis. I guess it is caused by food allergies and sensitivities and unfortunately for me, I have an extensive list of foods I am allergic to - about 35 of them, actually. So my diet has become extremely limited and my dietician is concerned that with the gastric sleeve I could become malnourished (my allergies severely limit the use of protein powders and I am essentially eating some meat and veggies and little else). You'd think I would be losing a lot of weight, but I'm not. I've lost a total of  a couple pounds in spite of eating about 800 to 1000 calories a day. I could look at the macronucrients to figure out what is not going right, but at this point it is so challenging to limit my diet, it is really taking all my focus.
 
My hope is that with this website I can hopefully find other people with EE who have successfully made it through surgery and are doing well. I hope to meet some people and get motivated about some very big changes soon to happen in my life!
 
Feel free to contact me at my email or message me. Safe journies to all of you and hoping you get a chance to say hello!