Esther Hollander struggled with her weight throughout her life. Little did she know that she had a disease that made it impossible for her to lose weight through diet or exercise.
Hollander, 47, suffers from lipedema, a collagen disease in which abnormal fat accumulates in the lower extremities, such as the buttocks, thighs and calves. cleveland clinic. Research estimates that 1 in 72,000 people (mostly women) have the disease, but it is likely underdiagnosed because it can present with obesity-like symptoms. It begins at different times, but usually during adolescence.
“As a child, my weight was very tied to my self-esteem,” Hollander says. “I’ve spent my whole life struggling with my weight, hoping that being smaller and thinner would somehow make me a better, more successful person.”
Hollander’s story speaks to the importance of advocating for yourself in a health care system that discriminates against many people, including overweight people, and how it can damage your mental health. Masu. (Hello, have you seen all the Ozempic chatter?!) Furthermore, society makes women feel like they need to seek out certain ways to get even better in this world.
“It’s really hard to be a bigger woman in a society where fat shaming is so prevalent,” she says. “There’s a huge weight stigma in the medical community. It’s a complete barrier to us getting treatment.”
“I want everything back.”
Hollander’s weight fluctuated over time as she tried one fad diet after another, from her teens to her mid-to-late 30s. She had (and she still has) bulimia.
“I would lose so much weight that something inside me would snap, and then it would just come back on, and then I would gain more,” she says. For most of her adult life, her weight was over 300 pounds, and even though she would sometimes lose half of it, she would gain it all back.
Hollander then accepted the possibility that she could grow bigger and still be healthy, taking control of her health and trying to become a personal trainer. But about three years ago, she noticed that the fat in her lower body was rapidly increasing, although she didn’t know it was lipedema.
“I could feel little nodules and particles under my skin.”
The shape of her feet began to change. A bump formed. “I could feel little nodules and particles under my skin,” she says. “There was a lobe on the back of her knee.” The change coincided with the beginning of the pandemic, which limited access to health care.
Hollander’s legs were heavy and weak, and her joints hurt. “It’s like walking around with iron bars and ricks in her legs,” she added. The loss of her athletic ability scared her, not to mention the embarrassment of her weight that she had already endured.
“Losing your mobility is the worst,” she says. “It’s not fun. It makes you feel really dirty and people look at you like, ‘You should lose a little more weight.'”
It took several doctors before they realized it had nothing to do with her obesity. This accusation was real and affected her psyche. “I felt vindicated, very angry and at the same time in tremendous physical pain,” she says. It became difficult to do her job and be the mother and wife she wanted to be.
Doctors finally told her it was lipedema, and she was able to put a name to the disease that had ruined her life.
Looking back, her mother and grandmother may have had the disease as well, but she doesn’t know for sure (the disease can run in families).
What is collagen? And what you need to know about how to increase it.
‘This is not your fault.’
The disease is resistant to traditional diet and exercise, making it difficult to lose weight. Conservative treatments include compression stockings and skin moisturizers in addition to lymphatic drainage massage. Although surgical intervention is a more invasive treatment, Dr. Jaime Schwartz believes that: Total lipedema care I swear, the Dutch took advantage of it. It helped restore her mobility, relieve much of her pain, and restore her energy. It’s certainly a physical treatment, but it can also boost her mental health.
Schwartz extracts all the tissue using a technique called . Manual lipedema extractionhe says he often performs the surgery on people who previously had lipedema treated with typical liposuction.
This disease is characterized by severe inflammation. Imagine having a pimple or cyst on your cheek for five or 10 years, says Schwartz. It’s quite red and painful, but it’s due to inflammation. all It kind of hurts.
“This is inflammation so severe that it sends chemical signals to the brain that say things like, ‘You’re sick,'” Schwartz added.
People fall frequently and are more likely to get bruises. Pain associated with walking is a major reason for treatment.
Hollander hopes medical professionals will take the diagnosis seriously. “When you go to the doctor’s office, there’s this assumption: ‘Go home and lose weight, you’re fat, it’s because you’re obese,’ and they don’t want to go any further,” she says. Masu. It’s “a real medical condition. If you have it, it’s not your fault.”
Hmm: Collagen powder is popular, but is it effective?