Barely breathing...

Yesterday was my 23rd birthday. That means it has officially been a year since law school stuff started for me. I spent the day helping welcome the new generation of 1Ls and being oriented to the law journal I am a staff member of. I met up with some friends at school and then I had a nice dinner with some great girls.

Everything seemed to be going relatively well until I got home. I was really sore from my run earlier in the day so I took some pain relievers. Next, my lip started swelling up and I took some Benadryl and went to bed. I woke up a couple of hours later only to have some trouble breathing. Upon consulting a nurse's hotline, I realized I needed to go to the Emergency Room. A friend of mine was so great and drove me to the hospital while I was freaked out and just plain scared.

To preface everything, this summer I developed some autoimmune issues. I would randomly, for no apparent reason, get hives and inflammation that would linger for hours frequently. Luckily, I do not have any food allergies. My allergist, however, said that I have slightly lower levels of white blood cells and higher levels of thyroid antibodies and chronic urticaria. What this basically means is that I have antibodies that sometimes attack my body instead of foreign pathogens. Unfortunately, the allergist said that there is no way to know how long the problem will exist, what specifically triggers the symptoms, and when the symptoms even would occur. Thankfully, the symptoms were more of a nuisance than a big safety issue and he prescribed allergy medicine and histamine blockers.

Tonight, at the hospital, I was hooked up to an IV containing Benadryl and steroids to calm down my inflammation and my throat constriction. It took a couple of hours and drowsiness that led me to nap until progress started showing and I could breath pretty normally. The doctor said that my autoimmune issues this time caused my throat tissues to swell up and thus caused my air passageway to shrink, making it hard for me to breathe. So it was a good idea for me to go to the hospital after all. She prescribed me steroids to take for the next week to hopefully keep any symptoms at bay.

My terrible scary night really showed me that I am loved by my friends. From the texts to the phone calls to the Facebook messages, I could tell that my friends were genuinely worried and cared about my well being. One of them even brought me an ice cream cake today to help make up for the fact that my night was so awful. My cousin brought me soup too. It also made me realize that life is not always going to be easy and I will have challenges to face, but I am so thankful that the ones I face are really miniscule compared to the ones people with terminal illnesses face. I will have to consult more specialists to see if they can figure out what the underlying problem is and how I can fix things so I do not have any dangerous symptoms like not being able to breathe in the future.

So I guess I started my 23rd year a lot differently than I had planned to. I am an extremely blessed girl and want to use the blessings I have been given to love others and be the best person I can be for others.

Back to Boston

I have been back in Boston for almost a week now, which signifies that the summer is really coming to a close. Unfortunately, Boston weather is anything but "end of summer weather" because it is incredibly hot and humid. I actually played ultimate frisbee in Boston Common (the oldest park in the United States) and it was almost unbearable; at the same time, it was a pretty cool experience to have.

My summer back in California was great; it was an amazing time for me to get some work experience, think about my goals, and also work A LOT on my faith. All these things showed me that this next year will be a very tough one for me, figuring out what I want to do (which is not big law!) and who I am, but it will be so good as well. This next semester will be busy with civil litigation clinic, working on a journal, job searching for government and public service jobs, getting involved with a church, and of course, training for a FULL (I officially decided to make the bump up to a full marathon) marathon. I am so so excited to be working on myself and pursuing my interests.