Serving God Amidst Your Chronic Illness with Lindsey Rice

Pain that starts in childhood is hard enough. Being dismissed by doctors while you’re still trying to figure out who you are can shape your entire life. We sit down with Lindsay, a Chicago-based teacher and leader with Perspectives USA, to talk about what it’s like to follow Jesus while living with multiple chronic illnesses, including Hashimoto’s, rheumatoid arthritis, fibromyalgia, Crohn’s disease, dysautonomia, POTS, and seizure symptoms that made daily life feel unpredictable.

We get specific about what these diagnoses can look like in real life: years of “growing pains” that weren’t growing pains, Crohn’s symptoms that didn’t match the usual script, and neurological issues that are so hard to describe you can only say, “Everything feels weird.” Lindsay also shares the rare gift of being believed by the right doctors and how collaborative care can change everything, especially when your file is complicated and your symptoms cross multiple body systems.

We also dig into chronic illness management in a way that’s honest and practical. Medication can be necessary and life-giving, but it’s rarely the only tool. We talk about diet changes like going gluten-free for inflammation, the value of physical therapy and counseling, the impact of sleep, and why patient advocacy matters so much for women navigating the U.S. healthcare system. Spiritually, we wrestle with identity, grief, and calling, holding to the truth that God doesn’t waste suffering or seasons, even when your original plans have to pivot.

If you’ve ever wondered how to serve God with limitations, Lindsay offers a framework that brings hope: go, send, welcome, and mobilize. Subscribe, share this with a friend who needs it, and leave a review so more chronically ill Christians can find this community.

• https://www.patreon.com/c/CWCIpodcast
• https://www.buzzsprout.com/2552643/support

Purchase here:
https://a.co/d/6dM3f89

Music for The Supernatural Case of an Accidental Time Traveler Ad:
https://uppbeat.io/t/prigida/sketch-book
License code: FFWQZDUHONOHPA8O

Transcript

Host Welcome And Show Setup

SPEAKER_01 0:00

I'm your Jesus loving and pote host, Elise Brigg. Welcome to Christians with Chronic Illnesses.

L. A. 0:19

Well, Lindsay, thank you so much for being on the podcast. I'm so excited to uh give some light to your story. I think your career and what you do is super unique, and so I'm excited for you to share about it. Thank you. Me too. Aww. So you want to start telling us about, you know, who is Lindsay? Who are you?

SPEAKER_00 0:40

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So I am Lindsay. I live in Chicago, Illinois. I live here with my husband, Jeremy. We've been married for 18 years already, been together for about 20.

L. A. 0:56

Again, you do not look old enough to be married for 18 years.

SPEAKER_00 0:59

It's awesome. It's kind of crazy. It really is to think about like two decades with him. That's, I mean, we've been together, yeah, for half my life, which is nuts. But we have two kids. So my daughter Emma, she's a sophomore

Lindsay’s Story And Global Mission Work

SPEAKER_00 1:15

in high school and she's 15. And my son, Luke, who's nine and a half. You have to add the half at that age. It's very important. You know. Um, and he's in he's in fourth grade. So they keep our lives very busy out here. Um, and I I'm a I'm technically what I am is a teacher, to be honest with you. But I work for an organization called Perspectives USA, and I get to use my gifts and passions for teaching within the organization. Basically, it's it's an organization that really tries to mobilize the church to engagement in God's global purpose. And we do that mobilization through education. So it's a 15-week course that's offered all over the nation and actually all over the world. And I've been coordinating and facilitating that class here in the Chicagoland area for about 15 years, and then about five years, I came on staff with the organization. And so I serve now as the executive mobilization director. So I kind of help to oversee some of the foundational components, but particularly the just support of our regional directors over kind of the central third of the United States. And so I still wear some extra hats, like so I'm sole regional director, so I still get to support the classes in about nine states in the Midwest. And then I'm an instructor, so I get to kind of just travel around and teach some of our classes, which I love getting to. And it's really, it's really fun to see what these classes look like in different states, different parts of the countries, you know, very different contexts. It's teaching your favorite part. Honestly, probably. I'm I'm a big people person. I love being around people, I love meeting new people, and I really love teaching. I love seeing helping like see light bulbs go off for people, you know, like help them really grasp sometimes difficult content, but I think also content that I just I know can impact them so deeply. And I think that's part of what makes perspectives so great, is that we have this phrase that one of our authors, Freud McClung, said that perspective is a class that will ruin you for the ordinary. Um, you know, and it's like it's it's about really pushing, especially in the USA, like pushing us outside of that kind of American dream comfort zone of like what are our lives really meant for? To really say, man, like God has a great purpose, and his purpose is to be glorified by all people. And so our lives purpose should look like that. Like, what does it look like for us to help see him glorified? What does it look like for us to help see all of the nations have an opportunity to glorify him? And so I think from there, people can really see, like, man, no matter where God has me in life, like he has a purpose for me. And man, even more than that, like he wants me to co-labor with him because God doesn't need us to complete his mission and mandate. But how cool is it that like the creator of the universe is like, no, I want you to do it with me. And so that's yeah, it's it's really, really sweet to get to help people see that and see they get to have a role to play and even help them see like what is my specific role. And they get to have such joy in it.

L. A. 4:30

Yeah, I think um I took a perspectives class. I think I might have mentioned that to you when I was in high school. And I think what stood out to me the most was from the beginning, and I didn't know this until I took the perspectives class, even when God had made his promise to Abraham, he said basically, you know, so that you can be a blessing to all nations. Like from the outset, God had love for the world and a plan to love the whole world. And so I think that perspectives was a valuable class that I took, at least, you know, eight years ago.

SPEAKER_00 5:04

So I love that you still remember that. Because yeah, you're totally right. I think that's always one of those like groundbreaking things is I think we think the idea of like go and make disciples of all nations. We've heard this for the first time, you know, in the book of Matthew, but we're like, no, this began in Genesis. This was God's plan from the start. He wants his people, they're blessed to be a blessing to the nations. Yeah. Yeah. I love it. Hey, that's a success. If you remember eight years later, that's that's a good thing.

L. A. 5:33

Yeah, yeah. It might have even been longer ago, I don't know. But yeah, and I think it's also important because I know a lot of Christians. Well, well, I can't say I know, but I'm sure there are a lot of Christians that similarly to me had a heart to go overseas and share Christ and then got chronically ill and their whole life changed. And so I think it's beautiful that you do work to help people find kind of their how they fit in in that life, even if they're chronically ill, as you know, being someone who is chronically ill.

SPEAKER_04 6:08

So exactly. Yeah. 100%.

L. A. 6:12

I love hearing your passion for your work. That's super cool. Anything else you'd like to share about yourself specifically, or would you like to go ahead and start talking about your diagnoses?

SPEAKER_00 6:22

Sure, yeah. I mean, honestly, I'm a pretty simple gal. The things I love the most are people, Jesus, traveling, reading, and Legos, honestly.

unknown 6:38

Legos! That's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 6:42

My my son and I especially, we really bond over that one. So our basement's a bit of a Lego cave. That's so cute. And then me and my daughter get to bond over reading, so it works nicely.

L. A. 6:55

That's adorable. Any successful Lego builds as of late? Ooh, great question.

SPEAKER_00 7:02

My son's been working on castles, he's in his castle era right now, so he's a lot of different types of castles. Um, for me, I have a lot of the Harry Potter Legos. Um, and so I'm a I'm a big fan of those. So I think the most recent one I did, actually, that well, my next one that I got for my birthday, I mean to build still, is the monster book of monsters. So that's next on the list. That's awesome. I love I love that so much. We gotta find that extra bit of joy somewhere in life, and yeah, like Legos and books.

L. A. 7:37

That's so cute. Legos. Oh, yeah. We used to have a lot of Legos growing up too. My dad had like huge tubs of them, like three huge tubs. It was great.

SPEAKER_00 7:48

Nice. Oh, that's phenomenal.

L. A. 7:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:50

Oh, and you know, I guess I did forget one thing. I if this is a big deal, I do have to say this. The other thing that's like absolutely necessary to know about me is that I'm Greek. And Greeks are obsessed with being Greek. So that's why I can't even move forward with this without telling you that I'm Greek. And it will probably

Trusting Jesus Through Grief

SPEAKER_00 8:10

come out at other times because we're very proud of it. So there you go.

L. A. 8:15

Okay, I love that. Okay, okay. So actually, before you jump into your diagnoses, I would love for you to share a little bit of your relationship with Christ. Just what who is Christ to you right now?

SPEAKER_00 8:28

Right now. Ooh, that's a really good question. You know, I think, you know, a a piece of my story really is how the brokenness I think that you feel when you realize you don't have control over your body the way that you think you do, it has required a and maybe created a level of just trust and relationship with the Lord. Like very much my story is is that brokenness is what brought me to really see my deep need for Jesus. And so I think I have what's been like a very precious gift to me is I feel like I've been very close to him for the vast majority of my life. Because I first became sick when I was, I mean, technically, I was like around eight, got my first diagnosis officially when I was maybe 13. So, like I have felt that brokenness from a very young age, and therefore I've also felt that intimacy with the Lord very early on. And so I'd say I feel that same thing today where I I've over the last few years walked through some difficult seasons. And even when I see myself distancing myself from the Lord just in grief, he doesn't ever distance himself from me. And so I just think I've been in this season where I just see the kindness and goodness of the Lord, where he just continually reminds me that he is with me and that he's for me. And that's just been incredibly, incredibly sweet.

L. A. 10:04

Yeah. Oh, that's beautiful. Thanks for the reminder. I love hearing that, you know, like I'm personally struggling a bit with grief right now, and remembering that even though we might distance ourselves from him very, very far, that he won't do that to you. That's such a beautiful reminder. So thanks for that.

SPEAKER_00 10:23

I think that's the praise I've gone back to him the most uh with over this this last season of grief has been like, man, Lord, you have every reason to drop me, you know, like you have every reason to be like, Lindsay, stop asking for my help here because you're you're not like trying to like even pursue this close relationship that you once had with me. But he he's not doing that. Rather, he's just saying he's like, Hey, I'm I continue to be here. I continue to be here. Yeah, and that's been very sweet. And it's made it that much easier then to move myself back closer to him.

L. A. 10:57

Oh, would you say in a way he's like a sense of stability for you? Oh goodness, yes. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:04

See the the majority of I would say like my childhood, especially is a lack of stability. And then, you know, adulthood certainly trying to create for myself some level of stability, but but the reality is, yeah, especially with chronic illness, there's there's always gonna be a level of a lack of stability, you know, that I have just absolutely no control over. And so yeah, I would definitely say the Lord is the one that helps to build a strong foundation.

Childhood Pain And First Diagnoses

L. A. 11:35

Yeah, absolutely. So tell us more about you. So you started feeling sick around eight, is that right? Okay, what did that start with? What's your earliest memory of being sick?

SPEAKER_00 11:47

I remember being a lot of pain, to be honest with you. I was in a ton of pain, legs and back. I remember in in fourth grade, I would ask my teacher if I could like kneel at my desk instead of sitting sometimes just because my body hurts so much. And luckily, she was really kind. She knew I was a good student. I wasn't trying to like cause trouble. And so she was like, Yeah, whenever you need to just move your chair from your desk and change the way that you're sitting, do whatever you need to do. And so I remember good for little Lindsay like advocating for herself. Right, right, trying. But you know, I would mention it to doctors and stuff, but the hard thing with just the reality is like we just don't really believe kids, you know. We make up a lot of excuses for why kids feel things. It's amongst my greatest takeaways for my own my own childhood is trying to like really make sure I believe my children well, you know. So, like, I'm sure sometimes my son's pediatrician is like, I don't think we need to test this. And I'm like, I'm gonna be honest with you, uh, you're just going to. Like he has this complaint, like, this is my health history. I'm I take everything seriously. So if it's a simple blood test, I'm just gonna ask you to do it. Because the reality is we missed out on years where we could have been treating me, but we just kind of kept calling that pain growing pain. But fun fact, I was super tiny and I wasn't growing. So I'm like, I don't think that's what it is. So it wasn't that would have been fourth grade, is kind of that memory, third or fourth, something like that. And it wasn't until I want to say seventh grade that finally they tested because they also, I was also so teeny tiny, and again, didn't really believe me when I said, no, I eat food, like I do all of that. So they kind of honestly, I felt very much like I was being shrugged off as somebody who's lying about their pain and lying about being bulimic, you know? I'm like, these are not the issues. Like I'm in a lot of pain and I eat, I do everything I'm supposed to, I'm really active, but I'm in a ton of pain. And yeah, I don't, I don't, I'm not, I don't seem to be growing, I'm not hitting benchmarks. And so yeah, finally, around seventh grade or so, I'm a little bit young for my grade. So I was probably something like 11, 12, something like that, 12, I think. They finally just ran a couple of very simple blood tests and realized I had something called Hashimoto's, which is a thyroid condition. And so that impaired my ability to gain weight or grow taller. And I had rheumatoid arthritis, and so that was causing the pain I had been in for years. And so the those those original diagnoses were incredibly validating and kind of yeah, opened up, really like started off the journey for my parents and I and what this whole chronic illness thing was going to look like. And to be honest, it was the giant learning curve. I can't imagine any parent is ready to take this on, you know. And you, I am just old enough that this is this is before Google, you know, this is before you could really look up symptoms or even just easily look up somewhere, like, hey, my daughter just got diagnosed with this. What are my expectations?

L. A. 14:55

You know, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:56

So they very much they wanted to find obviously the right doctors and whatnot, but it was also like, hey, what medicine can help her now? And then how do we get off of the medicine again? And so it took a while, even for me to like help them see this is a like a for life scenario, you know, like not that people aren't healed of chronic illnesses, but at the same time, like, no, like Hashimoto's like, this means my thyroid doesn't work. Like, and this medicine is a really good thing. We need to find the right medicine, the right dosage, and it's good and it's natural, and it's what my body needs to be able to do what it's meant to do. Um, the arthritis was a more difficult one to find the right medicine, a medicine that I was willing to take, that you know, insurance would cover all of those things because some of those medicines are really nasty. Yeah. Well, that one was a tri a bit of a trickier road, but yeah, those those were the ones that started everything off.

L. A. 15:49

Wow. Okay, so arthritis is that where the pain was coming from?

SPEAKER_00 15:54

Mm-hmm.

L. A. 15:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:55

So it began for me, it's it looks a little bit different for different people,

Autoimmune Arthritis Explained Simply

SPEAKER_00 16:00

but for me, it began in some of my larger joints. So it began kind of knees, ankles, and then particularly like my lower back. But rheumatoid arthritis and actually Hashimoto's, you can have hyper or hypothyroid disease, but Hashimoto's is the autoimmune version, and rheumatoid arthritis is the autoimmune version of arthritis as well, which means I feel like it's this is like the medical world's fancy way of saying we don't really know why your body's doing this, you know, like that's autoimmune diseases in a nutshell. Um, and the hard thing with them too is like if you have them for a long time, they tend to create more autoimmune diseases, which is why I say this was just the beginning because my body created more.

SPEAKER_03 16:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:46

Um, but but yeah, but so even within the rheumatoid arthritis itself, over time it has spread really to the vast majority of my joints. So it exists in my upper back, middle back, my hands, my shoulders.

L. A. 17:01

Is arthritis what like you know? I'm sure many people listening are familiar with the term arthritis and know people with it. Sure. But what is it? Or do they not know?

SPEAKER_00 17:12

So it just depends on the kind. I would say the nice thing with arthritis is it it has it's amongst the diseases that I would say we have a pretty good handle on. The reality is is just the best course of treatment looks different for different people. You know, some people gain arthritis because of an overuse of muscles, you know. So you're or not muscles rather, but joints. But so people who are like marathon runners, you know, can even in midlife start to form arthritis in, you know, hips or knees, things like that. Obviously, you hear about it in in the elderly, they get it after years of using your joints. It's it's it's a lot of it is uh almost a natural wear and tear. It's where the cartilage and things in your joints starts to wear down. And so different parts of your bone start touching and rubbing. The hard thing with the well, the tricky thing with rheumatoid is your cartilage isn't necessarily destroyed, but your body is sometimes acting like it is. Wow. So it's very interesting. So the upside to it is the damage looks different. So, like for instance, I have osteoarthritis in some of my joints, and that one it's not autoimmune, which is great because that means it doesn't, it's not quite as systemic. Uh, it's gonna be more localized to the specific joints that have it. The downside is though, is it's it's damage focused, and that damage tends to be pretty permanent. And so there's positive and negatives to everything. Autoimmune means realistically that it's gonna affect actually more than just what this disease would normally affect. So, like, for instance, I also have Crohn's disease. I affected that that I got later in life, and Crohn's, while it's a disease that infects your GI tract, the reality is is Crohn's actually affects almost every system of your body. Oh my goodness. Your brain, the way that it can affect affects your other organs, like it can even affect your your joints, can cause inflammation, all these other things. And so autoimmune diseases are a little bit tricky in that way. But but yeah, but at it at its heart, arthritis is basically it's affecting your joints. Okay.

L. A. 19:22

So Crohn's, you said it affects your GI tract, but then everything else. So what is Crohn's? What is I know that you have a plethora, and I'm actually like hope, you know, I'm I'm definitely willing to listen to to all of them because I think that it would be helpful for me and many others to be aware. Sure. Both so that if they're having similar symptoms, they can maybe mention it to the doctor. But or if their kids are having symptoms, yeah. But also, you know, if they know someone with these diagnoses, they can understand it better.

SPEAKER_00 19:55

Yeah. No, gosh, I appreciate that. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, as I as I got older, the order of everything is compopulated in my brain. That's fine.

Fibromyalgia And Crohn’s Reality Check

SPEAKER_00 20:05

Um, I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia. And so again, this is where I'm I'm old enough that fibromyalgia was a really not understood disease at that time. It took a long time to get the diagnoses, and the people that I knew had had it were like a couple of my friends' moms, and they were bedridden for years. And it was awful. And so so little was known. We didn't have any specific medication that had been like uh, you know, FDA approved to use for fibro. It was so misunderstood. We had no idea even what category it fell in. So it is it's such a different world today to have like medicine, to know it's autoimmune, to know rheumatologists are the ones that handle it largely, like to have good tests for it. So that that one was a very tricky one early on and was one that probably most affected my life for, I mean, probably like a solid 10-year run. It would have been like college and the years coming out of college. Fibro is an interesting one where it is heavily, heavily triggered by stress. And I would say, I mean, all chronic illness is, and all autoimmune diseases are particularly affected by stress. Fibro is one of those that I don't know, in my opinion, when when it is particularly active, the the trigger is so much worse. And so until you can find the right things to help your fibro mellow, it it takes the front seat pretty fast. That one was was a tricky one in college to figure out. And then I had gotten married just a little bit after college. And so I actually didn't, I didn't work full time at first. So when I got married, there were I had been sick both with my fibro and with my Crohn's disease, though I still hadn't gotten the Crohn's diagnosis yet in college. I was so sick to the point that I considered leaving a year early, taking a break to try to figure out what was going on in my body. Then coming back to finish. But luckily, I had just instructors who were very kind and worked with me when I couldn't be at class. Yeah. Um, we're just gonna power through, we're gonna finish the degree, and then after college, we'll work part-time. I was a teacher, so I worked part-time as a teacher, and I used the remainder of my time to honestly like get the best doctors I could to try to figure out what was going on in my body. And so at that time, yeah, it was my the Crohn's disease then. And so what that had looked like for me, honestly, and this is where it's so tricky, is so many of these diseases, they look really different in different people. But for a lot of people with Crohn's disease, they lose a ton of weight because honestly, they're usually they're having like a lot of diarrhea, like their body does not know how to process or they're not absorbing nutrients and your colon, especially, but like your large intestines are getting just destroyed from this disease. And then, and again, for different people, it looks different as to how it can affect other parts of you. For some people, you know, it can also come along with things like dry eyes, dry mouth, dry skin. It can come along with like a lot of stomach pain. So it looks, it looks very different for different people. For me, what was really unusual was actually it was like the most extreme constipation you've ever heard of. And like, I didn't really put it together at first. All I knew was every time I was eating, I was vomiting. And so I like didn't want to eat, to be honest with you, because I was so sick every time. But then obviously I had no energy because I couldn't take in food without immediately vomiting it afterwards, and so it took me a while to figure out why it was happening, but I realized I wasn't ever emptying my bowels, and so literally my body couldn't put anything else in it. So whenever I would, it just came out right, and so again, it took a super long time to figure out what it was, how to get any level of relief. And to be honest with you, I mean, so that would have been it was about a little over 20 years ago where when my symptoms started. Crohn's is a tricky one because it actually the statistic might be a little bit old, but it was valid maybe 10 years ago. So it's probably a little bit different now. But it takes an it takes an average of seven years to get a diagnosis of Crohn's. Because you can actually take biopsies and have them continually come back negative for years, even though your body is symptomatic to the disease. And so you can know, like my doctor was like, I'm telling you, Lindsay, you match up to Crohn's, even though yours is a little bit bonkers in some of the ways that are. He's like, But I think that's what it is, but until a biopsy comes back positive, we just can't know. And so we kept testing for other things, tried to just stay on top of what was going on, tried to help me make sure I could actually like clear my bowels in some way so I could get some level of relief. But yeah, it took, it took, I was right on that average. It took about seven years for the biopsies to finally come back positive, so then insurance would finally actually cover it. It's it's a whole fun, fun little game because it's never, you know, the system is very broken, and so it's really difficult to figure out how we best help people.

SPEAKER_01 25:18

Yeah.

L. A. 25:20

Wow, that's crazy. So that was Crohn's that had all the the complications with digestion and stuff.

SPEAKER_00 25:28

Yes, yeah, yeah. And then, you know, with that you get different pieces. Like I was diagnosed with GERD for a while, yeah. So kind of, you know, more disease of the esophagus. But also what I realized as kind of time went on was I was getting diagnosed with a lot of different diseases and starting to see as we I think uh because we are continually every year, every decade, learning more about the human body. To be honest, especially about women. Like we really historically haven't done great medical research on women. And so the more that we do, the more that we understand how unique the female body is and the way it interacts with disease. And so today we have some answers to this and some that I'm to be honest with you, I'm still pursuing, where I think some of my individual disease diagnoses are actually symptoms of probably one larger disease, you know? So, like even when I was diagnosed at first with GERD or they're trying to figure out I was having some sort of like acid reflux problem that were like, how much is that related to the Crohn's? How much is it something totally different? Well, I later, a few years after that, got diagnosed with a disease called dysotonomia, which is a disease that affects the autonomic processes of your nervous system. And so all of the things that happen in your body naturally,

Dysautonomia, POTS, And Seizure Warnings

SPEAKER_00 26:45

like breathing and sweating and heart rate, and things like your ability to swallow, the your valves opening and closing, this disease affects your ability to do the, to, to do all of that. So I didn't actually have GERD. Rather, what I had was my brain misfired and I wouldn't wasn't swallowing right. And so it was causing this problem and this like damage, more or less, but it was a neurological issue, not one that was actually happening within my GI tract. And so that's where it's very tricky. So even the medication that we use to treat a lot of my illnesses are not so much in the end actually about treating that organ. It's really about treating my brain. So my brain is sending the right signal to that organ so it can work the way it's supposed to work. So that was a that was a big one to figure out, and another one that again took a long time for the dysautonomia. I traveled to Mayo several times. Oh some phenomenal doctors here in Chicago. It took a long time to figure out what was going on with my brain, because that one actually, the really obvious symptoms that were were like, oh, something neurological is going on, was I started having what's called absent seizures, which are seizures where you don't pass out or convulse, but literally it almost seems like you space out, you know. It's like if you've ever just been like, Oh, were you talking? I think I spaced out for a minute, you know, like almost a little ahead in the clouds. So sometimes it's hard to know unless it's like super obvious or somebody around you sees that you're doing it. We figured it out because I was driving. It happened multiple times while driving, where I would be here, and then all of a sudden I would be here and I would say, How did I arrive this location now? That's luckily not far. They were very short, you know, it's like 20 seconds kind of a thing. But we realized something is happening here. And then it was met met with other symptoms as well. But it all became very clear something's going on. My brain, there seems to be some level of slowing, was having a hard time with my memory, with finding words, a lot of stuff that to be honest, a I was, I think maybe 23 at the time, a 23-year-old girl doesn't usually deal with. And so that one, that one was another long journey. And to be honest with you, that one is it's it's a lesser known and understood disease. At the time, there wasn't a ton of doctors on it. And to still, like, I actually I I just signed up for a new doctor that in my area, and it takes about an hour, a year and a half to get in with that. So it's it's a fun one. But as you know, like POTS is kind of under that umbrella. And so POTS was also one of the diseases I got diagnosed with at that time because I was having issues where, yeah, my blood pressure would suddenly drop super fast when I would stand up or move around, my heart rate would shoot up out of nowhere. So, again, so I'm I'm grateful to places like the Mayo Clinic and others who were able to finally get to the bottom of it. But so the neurological stuff has been a lot of my adult life trying to figure all of that out and how it changes and affects things. Later, I started I had a petite mall seizure. So again, where it actually, you know, you pass out and you do convulse. And so that was a different level of the disease than I had reached before. And the hard thing is again, like the diseases trigger each other. So then that triggered my fibro for the first time in a long time. And so it began a couple of years of a lot of pain. And so it's it's tricky. It's it's what I would say when it comes to chronic illness, I've been walking this road for a long time, but in a lot of different iterations, you know, like it's you walk that journey first of like symptoms, then you know, new diagnosis, and then learning how do you what adjustments do you make in life in order to be able to take on that diagnosis and find then some level of like peace and learning to live your life. But when it's multiple diseases, you're you're reliving all of those stages over and over again, you know, and you'll get certain ones that go into remission and the reasons why they come back out of remission, like for each of each of my babies, Emma. Her pregnancy put so much stuff into remission, and I had a beautiful like five years, yeah, where things were much chiller, and then my sweet baby boy Luke kicked everything out of remission, and it was an insane couple of years. So it's it's a lot of different iterations of the same journey over and over again.

L. A. 31:31

Wow, that sounds uh I don't even know, confusing.

SPEAKER_00 31:38

A little chaotic sometimes.

L. A. 31:40

Do you mind name-dropping a few good doctors you found in Chicago? Ooh, great question.

SPEAKER_00 31:47

I it's so tricky because COVID really shook up the medical system. And so so many doctors have moved around.

Doctors Who Listen And Keep Digging

SPEAKER_00 31:55

Dr. Mootlu, M-U-T-L-U, she was my GI doctor for a long time. And man, she was phenomenal. I felt so heard by her, so understood. I feel like a lot of my stuff has never there's few of my diseases like check every obvious box. So especially my Crohn's was super not obvious for a long time. And then a lot of the things that have happened within my GI track even since. And she was so great about saying, She's like, Lindsay, I fully believe you. I see, like I see that there is something wrong. I know it's so frustrating that we aren't getting like clarity, but we're not gonna stop until we figure this out. Oh, that's awesome. That's a good doctor. It's just so wonderful. Yeah. I had another doctor, Dr. Robert Katz, K-A-T-Z. I'm pretty sure he's still in Chicago. I haven't been with him lately, but he was my rheumatologist as I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, and he was the one that was finally able to find a way for my fibro to go into remission. And so he always just did a phenomenal job, like trying out different medicines, again, listening to me well and what my body was feeling, taking it seriously, being creative. And then he was great too. And I was like, I'm sure you've done something similar where I'm like, hey, I know you don't actually deal with this part of the body, but I'm having this other random symptom. Any advice? Or do you mind just like checking a blood level for me on that one? And he'd be like, Yeah, that totally makes sense. Let's check this. Um, so you always love those kinds of doctors that are like team players with you.

L. A. 33:27

Oh, for sure. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:29

Right now I see uh Dr. Carrie Richardson. She's at out of Northwest, most of my doctors are a rush, but she she used to be, but now she's at Northwestern. And so she's been managing my my all my rheumatological stuff, and she's just the best. She's been so great to work with. And so actually, the medicine that we found to help with that has also been treating micrones. That's the upside to autoimmune diseases, is a lot of time because the issue isn't actually the organ, the an auto uh autoimmune medication can treat more than one autoimmune disease. And so that actually has been really great. So she's been phenomenal at helping me figure that that piece out. So yeah, so so many great doctors that man have have carried through really tricky scenarios, who have carried through the loss of other doctors. So like, I don't have my a rheumatologist right now. This person moved to a different place. Would you mind just checking my sed rate? Would you check, you know, like check these levels just so we know what's my R8 factor? Things like that. Just on my, I just want to be able to keep up with my blood tests, make sure things are looking good. So I've been I've been very blessed. And that's been one of those other upsides to living in a big city like Chicago, is like we have phenomenal hospitals and phenomenal. So I've been I've been very lucky.

L. A. 34:47

Okay, so if you're in the Chicagoland area, check out, check them out.

SPEAKER_00 34:52

Yeah, Chico. Yeah, anywhere I can help point people in the right direction. Always always down for that.

L. A. 34:58

Oh, that's so sweet. Okay, so do you think right now with your chronic illnesses, what do you think is the main one? Or I don't know, that's probably tricky with how many you have, but what would you say is the main

The Neurology Symptoms Taking Over

L. A. 35:12

I don't want to say bully, but kind of right now.

SPEAKER_00 35:16

Who's causing the most trouble? Yeah. It's a good question. I would say probably my neurological stuff is the biggest at the moment, just because of the way it affects so many things. And especially this is another like fun one for women as our bodies just change as we're older and hormones change. It can throw so many things out of whack. And so it is this fun game of like, so what's a new symptom? Or, you know, what's actually a side effect from a medication, you know, or what's a symptom of a disease I already have, but maybe it's just different than what I've experienced before. There's always that fun little game. But neurologically, this is where I see again, I I continue to see an increase in difficulty finding words, difficulty accessing memories. You know, you could be like, What did you do yesterday? And I'm like, I'm gonna need a solid five minutes, and probably I'm gonna need to look at my calendar to tell you for sure, you know, like really difficult to recall. It exists somewhere, but the ability to actually grab stuff and bring it forward is very difficult. And gosh, other other pieces within that where my oh oh my brain sometimes struggles to do multiple things. So I've actually been very lucky. I have this phenomenal neuro PT. Her name is Kelsey, and she is so great. She was the first person, because here's the thing like when your nervous system is going crazy, uh, it's really hard to put clear words to that. Because it it like, I don't know if you know, anybody that's listening, if for instance, maybe let's say you wear glasses, it's probably the closest thing I can compare it to. Is at first you're just like you're aware that like you're getting these headaches, or that sometimes you're having pain, you know, in this part of your head, and you're just like, maybe you notice things are a little bit blurry, but what you really just notice is like the world looks weird, but you're not sure why, and it just throws you off kilter. I that would be true for a lot of like neurological stuff where you're just like the world is weird, and I don't know how to put into words that it's real, that it's weird, you know? So sometimes we have words for it like dizziness, vertigo, I'll have a lot more drops in my blood pressure or spikes in my heart rate, things like that. But other things where I'm just like, I don't know what to tell you, but I can, but what I do know is that I'm not taking in anything around me in the way I'm supposed to right now. I can tell you everything is weird, I don't like the feeling, and I don't know what to do with it. Yeah and it's not all the time, but some of the times. And so it's really, it's really hard to put that together. And so luckily she's just a pro at knowing how the brain works. And so she ran a couple of different tests, and I was like, Oh my gosh, how did you that exactly showed what my issue was. But so, like one, even for instance, was like, I and again, the way I was putting it into words was like my body won't do the things that I'm telling it to do. And so she would have me do like two tasks at the same time, or a task that's like a little bit tricky. So, like, for instance, she'd have me sit in a chair and then using only one leg, try to push myself to a standing position and then still standing on just the one leg, lower myself back into a sitting position. And I it wasn't that my muscle couldn't do it, but my brain literally couldn't, it just wasn't connecting to my leg to actually move my body. And so it was so oh man, very validating, very helpful to be like, oh my gosh, this is it. You can see it, you can see it. Yeah, yeah, you know, even things like she'd have me do squats while holding a pole should should not be a hard thing, you know. Like you're just squat like a totally normal exercise, and you're holding a stick, you know. Yeah, no big deal. But my body couldn't do both of them at the same time. Wow, it was it's wild. And and to be honest, I still can't fully tell you why, other than like my something neurologically is. Yeah, the wires were going crazy. Um it was actually, and she actually realized recently too, there's a certain there's two different parts to like your balance system. I'm gonna butcher this a little bit because I'm not a neurologist, but there's two different parts of your balance system. One of them is your eyes, right? Like our eyes are the best way that we balance our bodies in the world. But for people with dysotonomia, and sometimes this is true for pots, so you might know this as well. If you close your eyes, then all of a sudden your body starts to do this because it's been depending on your eyes for balance. And this other part starts with a V, and I can never remember it. This other balance system isn't working correctly. And so, again, she did a couple of exercises, it was wild. Like I nearly fell over trying to do them and whatnot. And she's like, Okay, yeah, that balance system isn't working correctly. I actually just started with a new neurologist recently because my neurologist moved away and I was telling him about some of the stuff, and he's like, Oh, these are great. Your PT is phenomenal. Yeah, for real. Very encouraging. So, you know, working at it from a lot of angles, you know, it's finding medicine that's helpful, but also like, what are what are the other things? How else can we help to kind of retrain my body to do the things that it needs to do instead of totally giving up on the fact that my brain can never be rewired? Um, so I've been I've been very grateful for that. But yeah, so nervous system is the biggest piece.

L. A. 40:46

So, how have you sorry, wait, what was the biggest piece?

SPEAKER_00 40:49

The nervous system.

L. A. 40:50

The nervous system, gotcha, gotcha. How have you, because I think peop most people who are chronically ill know typically it's about management of symptoms, and I know that you uh express in our pre-interview wanting to talk about management and medicine

Managing Symptoms With More Than Meds

L. A. 41:06

and how all those interact. So, how have you managed your symptoms of your many chronic illnesses?

SPEAKER_00 41:13

It's a good question. It's it's it's it's so so many pieces to it, you know. Yeah, um, but I think one of the one of the first things that we always think through is is medication, you know, what it what exists that can be helpful while acknowledging all the things that you're allergic to or that interact with one another, or even, I mean, honestly, for me, like it began with age, you know, there's a lot of medication that you don't start with children, and because I began being sick then and we were so limited. But so yeah, so over time it's been a lot of that, a lot of playing with medicine to try to figure out what is the right thing in the right season, knowing like I have had medicines that have worked great for 10 years and then they suddenly stop working, you know, and you kind of restart that process and find the next thing and in hopes that it will work. But also, it's a big piece of like not just relying on medication, you know, there's your our bodies are beautiful things, even though we don't understand them. And there are other ways to handle things. So to be honest, like for my Crohn's, for instance, because I went so long without being able to use like an actual Crohn's medication, and we were trying, trying a couple of different meds to help with some symptoms. The thing, honestly, that managed my Crohn's disease for about a decade was I changed my diet. So I removed gluten. So like I still today I eat gluten-free. I try to minimize my dairy, but you know, ice cream is pretty delicious, so I sometimes break it out. Um and I try to keep like my sugar levels low. That helps a couple of my diseases as well. But again, I love candy, so I have to I have to be careful. The gluten though, I'm very strict on because the gluten alone managed so much of my Crohn's disease. So, like one of the best things I can tell you is like, hey, if if you haven't, and I'm and I just say this from a place of experience. This would annoy me if somebody who wasn't sick said this. Right because I'm sick, what I'll tell you is please don't like have a major surgery before you've changed your diet, you know, like, you know, and again, I'm not meaning like if you break your leg, but for something like Crohn's, for instance, like you can get part of your intestines removed, for instance, that are the most affected areas. And that's a pretty natural like thing that happens where people have had Crohn's for a long time. And it's to be honest, it's something that I'll probably have done to at some at some point. But if you had people do that without ever changing anything that they eat first, I'm like, this is a disease in your GI tract. Like, address it with food, see how much that helps. Cause even if it can buy you time, even if it can buy you 10 years before a surgery, man, take it, you know? So that was really big. It really the lack of gluten helped to bring down my inflammation levels in general. So that helped a ton with my arthritis. Pain, it helped with my fibromyalgia. So I saw a lot of fruit from that. I'm a big believer in therapy. Like, so again, whether that's physical therapy or whether that's seeing a counselor, that's hugely helpful. Because to be honest, again, like autoimmune disease oftentimes is triggered by trauma. And so usually so unfortunate.

L. A. 44:21

You get trauma in an autoimmune disease.

SPEAKER_00 44:23

Well, and it's because our bodies don't know what to do with it, you know, like trauma is felt at every level of ourselves. And especially if you're in a scenario where you don't get to like talk out loud about your trauma, you have to keep it stored in. That means your body is storing in all of that and it's gonna get sick from it, you know? And so, like for me here as an adult, I'm trying to process past trauma. And a big piece of that is in hopes that it makes my body healthier too, because that way it's storing a lot less of this. But even without like even if your story is not autoimmune, not trauma-related at all, still like talking to somebody else about the reality of your illness, the way that it affects you, even if you talk to a therapist just once a month, but to have some kind of outlet, it's just so good for your health. So I'm a big, big fan of that. And you know, continually finding ways to keep your body active. There are a lot of my diseases scream, please sit on a couch, you know. Um, but you know, things like even when I rec referenced fibromyalgia, like these women that had it and we had no idea why, like their bodies were in so much pain, and fibromyalgia affects connective tissue. And so there are multiple major points in your body where large levels of muscle tissue come together. So, again, almost think joints, they're not exact joints, but like it's very similar where you have one part of your arm and the other part of your arm connecting, those muscles are connecting together, and fibromyalgia affects those connecting points. And one of the things it does in particular is it makes the healing of them not happen as automatic as it does for other people, like while they're sleeping. And then it also makes it so that way you're feeling pain, even if there's no reason to feel pain. Oh man.

L. A. 46:12

Um sorry, all my friends out there with fibromyalgia, including you. That's that's rough.

SPEAKER_00 46:17

It's not a fun one, it's not a fun one. But so, like, because we didn't know it, these women were just on bed rest, and we learned that like that made it worse. Not using those tissues at all was causing like genuine damage. And so now that we understand it better, we're like, okay, there's a reality of the fact that you are in pain, and so like the movements you can do are very limited. Yeah, but how do we still prioritize you know, walking, you know, lifting very small weights, little things? So again, I'm not the person that's gonna tell you to go run a mile, but but even if it's just walking from the front of your house to the back of your house, you know, make making sure that your body's moving, that's been huge for management. And then the other piece, honestly, is is advocacy. I think we feel a lot more hope in our illness when we learn about it. We arm ourselves with information, yeah. We arm ourselves

How To Advocate Without Burning Out

SPEAKER_00 47:10

with understanding our own bodies and how they're responding, and we go into appointments with a high level of confidence. That's hard. How do you do that? That's so hard, super hard, you know, and it's not something that comes natural for a lot of people. I'm I I can be strong-willed, so it's a little bit easier for me. But to be honest with you, like totally raw, our medical system, again, especially here in America, is not built as one that naturally believes women, you know, like when I was young, it was that we don't really believe children, but we don't really believe women. And so we're not taken quite as seriously. And then the other, the other difficult part about knowing your body and knowing what to ask for is in this like very digital world, we can mistake somebody's confidence and knowing their body as somebody who's just like digitally diagnosed themselves. So they'll be like, Well, I guess that the internet told you that this is this, but I don't know about that. And then I have to be like, I actually need you to step back for a moment. Like, this is not, you know, Google telling me what to do here, but also like I've been sick for a long time and I know how to use the internet in the same way that you know. Like, you as a doctor use the internet because it has a lot of resources and including scholarly materials. Yeah. So, like, all of your education exists on the internet too. I know how to use that also. I know my body and I know my diseases. And so when I tell you that I need you to take this seriously or I really need you to run this test, like I'm game for a conversation. But if you're gonna make it seem like I don't know what I'm talking about, then we're gonna have like a genuine issue here. And so luckily, the nice thing is like when you have a million diseases, even a new doctor looks at your file and they're like, Oh, you're juggling a lot of things and you have for a long time. And I'm like, Yeah, that's why if I sound like I know what I'm talking about, it's because I do. And if I sound like I'm don't know what I'm talking about, that should tell you that there's something new going on. And I'm asking you for help. Yeah, because I I don't am out of my league now. The upside to have issues in like every system of my body is there's a decent amount that I know. So even some of my doctors will be like, you know, Lindsay, I have a new patient that I think has pods. Who do you think I should refer them to first? Should I go cardio or should I go neuro? And I'm like, great question. I'm like, well, it obviously affects the heart, it's a neurological disorder, and I would start there. And they're like, okay, that's helpful.

L. A. 49:48

And I'm like, That's incredible. That's incredible. You have doctors asking your advice.

SPEAKER_00 49:53

Oh, you know, it's like it's it's mutual respect. And that's that's my desire and my demand, to be honest with you. You know, is like like I'm gonna respect you and the amount that you know and your experience, and I need you to respect me and what I know and my experience.

L. A. 50:09

Wow, bars. So that's good.

SPEAKER_00 50:12

Having a good advocate for yourself, huge. Wow.

L. A. 50:17

Yeah, that was so good. Yeah, I know that's so hard for those of us who are more people pleasing and um right. I don't want to say humble, but maybe um not humble, not not quite as competent. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 50:36

Yeah. And I can I can be a pretty big people pleaser, but I can also be quite a challenger. So I let the challenger take the wheel.

L. A. 50:45

That's great. Okay, what would be your recommendation? Like, how would you encourage people who struggle to advocate for themselves and their chronic illness to doctors? What would be like a piece of advice for them?

SPEAKER_00 50:58

You know, uh two things. I think one, be really good at taking notes. Take good notes about your symptoms, keep track of what things look like, because facts are always great at empowering us. Having things written down to offer doctors that builds trust too for a doctor to a patient when they know, okay, like you're you're taking this seriously, you have good notes for me, you're giving me this evidence. It helps them be better listeners. So I would start there. But second, if you have a friend that's a good challenger, that's a good advocate, bring them to appointments with you. And again, it doesn't have to be uh for everything, you know, but at least at least for a handful until you kind of find your voice. Like having somebody there who can say, hang on for a second, I'm not sure about that. Can you explain that again? Or I'm not sure that you heard, but she has this symptom also. Can you address that? Because I think we're missing it. So sometimes that extra person who their whole entire goal is to make sure you get heard that's that goes a long way. Yeah, yeah.

L. A. 52:03

I've done that before too. Yeah. It's very helpful. Yeah, I've had the same friend go with me to multiple appointments, and she has spoken up before.

SPEAKER_00 52:13

And I I offer my services to my friends also, and I've done it many times. Yeah, really does it. I'll be like, I don't know that you took her blood pressure correctly. Can you redo that, please? And they're like, uh, who is this lady? That's helpful. Awesome. Take care of each other. Yeah, that's beautiful. So what we need people and community when we're sick.

L. A. 52:34

Yeah. It's good. So, what's helped you spiritually through all of the symptoms and the discipline of the management with the food? And I don't know if sleep schedule is a big thing for you, but lots of people have to yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 52:49

I have to get a lot

Sleep, Identity, And Feeling Flaky

SPEAKER_00 52:50

of sleep. Like that, honestly, like this might sound really silly, but this was one of those big pieces I had to grieve because in college, you know, in college you sleep like four hours a night, you know, like it's oh yeah. And I'm I'm a giant extrovert, especially then. Like, if you've ever done like, you know, Myers Brig or whatever, I think my extrovert level was like 94%. Like it's like it's less now having children and growing tired over time, it goes down, but it's still like 82, you know, it's still pretty hot. I'm very much fueled by other humans. And in college, you know, living in dorm lifestyle where you're with people all the time is like peak extrovert season, you know. But as I was sick with my fibro, although we didn't know what it was yet, I realized like if I didn't sleep enough, I couldn't move the next day. And so having to like shift to sleeping more and saying no to doing fun things. Like again, this sounds silly in a scope of awful side effects you can have and realities of diseases. But as far as like the things that you enjoy doing in life, it was awful to have to like learn to say no to friends and to prioritize sleep and and such. I agree. Yep, it's it was not not fun. Today I'm like, I need sleep, peace out, let's go, you know. Yeah, but yeah, I I have to be kind of merciless in that area, otherwise, I know realistically I'm sacrificing the entire next day at a minimum. Yeah.

L. A. 54:15

Oh, wow. Yeah, I think what I'm struggling with right now is like somewhat similar because I'm also extroverted. But as you said, once you kind of get sick and as you're getting older, I'm only 25, but you that starts to change. And but I think what I'm struggling right now is the feeling of like I'm I feel like I'm that flaky friend, even though I know I'm not, right? Like I know that I would be there in a heartbeat, like I would drive whatever distance, I would stay up as late as needed, I would be there as long as wanted. But now, you know, even having friends come over is exhausting, and typically it's having friends coming over that's what has to happen because they can't drive long distances, right? But yeah, that and I have sacrificed my sleep for the past couple months that it's not been good, you know. That's been a reflection into how I'm feeling. But I think that struggle of like, I don't want to seem like the flaky friend that's like, oh yeah, like let's hang out, and then the day comes and literally an hour before I'm like, I'm so sorry, I'm not feeling it. Like, that's hard because especially when you want to be a dependable person, you know, you want to be the one that can be there for someone in the middle of the night. You want to be someone that you know is called upon, or like people know that you're reliable. And so it's hard when that's your personality and who you want to be, but your body isn't. Your body isn't dependable, your body isn't reliable. Yep.

SPEAKER_00 55:49

So you know, and it hits on like what you're saying, it hits on like a really important piece is when is it's identity, you know, is like we don't want to be our identity to be tied up in our illnesses, you know, like who we actually are is the core of our identity, and yet these qualities and characteristics of us that we find to be so essential to who we are get challenged very deeply by our illness. And it can feel it can make us feel even not understood. Uh, it can feel make us feel very betrayed by our own, our own bodies, our own selves. And it is hard. Like I find myself still today probably over-explaining myself in scenarios because who I am is not what's being seen, you know, because yeah, either I'm canceling things or I'm responding in a really weird way because my my brain's not working correctly, or whatever that is, you know. I'm like, man, I feel like this is so contrary to who I am. Or even like I was having a meeting with my the executive team that I'm a part of, and we were kind of sharing a bit about each of us and our personalities and how we best work. And I was like, man, I hate that I have to even include this in this conversation about who I am. Yeah, you guys have to know, like I do have a lot of illnesses, and maybe we're in a meeting, and it might look like I'm really mad at you. I'm not, like, I'm just my body hurts, and so the way I look is gonna look different. You're gonna be like, Lindsay, usually you're so smiley and cheery, but something's going on. Are you upset? Whatever, and it's like, well, no, it's just like it's a rough pain day, you know? Yeah, and that's just a reality of something that I have to handle, you know, and you just have to know it about me, even though I don't want it to be this identity, you know.

L. A. 57:40

Yeah, dude, I agree with that a hundred percent. Meeting bosses from the outset or meeting co-workers, it's like that conversation is so hard to navigate because it's like I don't want to look like I'm identifying as a victim of my illness, but also you need to know if I'm you know laying on the floor in the office, I'm gonna be okay. Right.

SPEAKER_00 58:01

Right. I just give me a few minutes, please. Bring me a glass of water.

L. A. 58:08

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, for sure. So, what do you think are I don't know, some truths or Bible verses or I don't know, promises of God that have helped you to not identify with your illness in that way of it being the core of who you are, or that have just gotten you through your pain?

SPEAKER_00 58:31

Yeah. You know, I think when I was very young, I mean, I guess very young is probably not the right word, but like, you know, junior high, high school, as I was processing all of the ways that my illnesses affect my body, because I would call myself

Scriptures That Hold You Up

SPEAKER_00 58:45

a very, I was I've always been a pretty independent person, self-sufficient. So even as a kid, it was like I I can do things. I'm smart, I'm capable, and just a mix of hard things happening in life, as well as then my body kind of breaking down. I just realized, oh, I actually can't do any of this myself. And so while I grew up in the church, like that was very much when I was like, okay, God, I guess I need you. Either that or like to be honest, I don't even think I want to live this life because this sucks. And so the Lord very much took me out of what was, I mean, just the darkest spot I've ever been in. And helped me just like rely on him, find hope in him, trust in him. And so the the scripture that I I really clung to back then was Philippians 4 13. Like, I can do everything through him who gives me strength. And again, it's it's not with that notion of I need to be able to do any everything, but rather like it's okay that I'm actually not self-sufficient because God is the one who does it. And so his strength is the strength that I need in order to be able to endure whatever it is, you know. And then, oh, I wish I could remember the exact this is where my my memory is really messing with my uh Bible verse recall. It's in Corinthians, but that talks about how like our weaknesses and our frailties are those opportunities where we actually get to see that in our weakness we see God's strength, Christ's strength. And so that one's been very, very big over the last gosh, probably decade of my life, maybe even longer, of just that reminder of God has been brought a lot of glory through my weakness. And that's, I mean, that's probably the the biggest continuous storyline, story arc throughout my entire lifetime has been God bringing himself glory in the areas in which I'm weak. Because to be honest, even when I teach, excuse me, when I teach for perspectives and I'm telling the story for myself of how I got to where I am with perspectives, a lot of that is like I intended to go overseas long term. I was in that process though of figuring out what eventually became Crohn's, what eventually became dysautonomia. And in that season was like, Lord, man, we need to get diagnoses to know if we can even go overseas and do this work. And then as I got sicker and sicker, kind of eventually came clear because we were really praying, like, is this the enemy trying to stop us, or the Lord, Lord, are you asking us to stay? And it became clear that he was asking us to stay, and that was uh heartbreaking. But he used this desire we had to go and he shifted it. And so we welcome international students, refugees, and then I work with perspectives, and so it's a beautiful reminder that God's never wasted anything, he's never wasted this passion that we that we've had, uh, but it just looks different, and so like with perspectives, he used this thing that I'm already really gifted at in teaching, and I get to combine it now with this building of his global kingdom. So it's like, man, that totally makes sense. Of course, that's been your plan from the start. But when I share my own story, even of yeah, just this change of plans and this pivot that the Lord did like gave for us, that in and of itself, like almost every time I teach to this to a class and I tell my story, there's always at least one person with chronic illness in that class that comes up to me afterwards and says, Man, Lindsay, thank you for sharing that story. Like I'm dealing with the same thing and trying to figure out, man, Lord, like what do you have for me? Like, what do I even do? I feel like I I can't hold a job, I struggle to hang out and like be in community with other people. Even just doing this class is really difficult. And so to know that like the Lord's not gonna waste this passion I have that I have and that He is He has a role for me, it's huge. And so it's like, man, if if my story gets to bring God glory in that way over and over again, yeah, that's pretty sweet.

L. A. 1:02:56

So what would your suggestion be to someone asking that question of you know they have a heart to serve the Lord, maybe overseas, maybe not. And let's say they were dead set, like for me,

New Paths To Serve When Plans Die

L. A. 1:03:10

for example, I was convinced I knew where God wanted me, how he wanted me, when he wanted me, and then I got pots in about 2021, 2022, and here I am still three, four years later, just now kind of accepting and grieving that like that probably won't happen. So, what would be, I mean, for me, for those listening who are maybe grieving the life that they thought they were gonna live. I know that there's dancers, you know, who wanted to dance for God's glory. I know there's singers who wanted to be musicians for God's glory, all those things. What would be your suggestion is they are trying to figure out like what do I do now for God's glory? What do I do now for my life and my career?

SPEAKER_00 1:03:54

Yeah, yeah. Gosh, good question. I'm gonna I'm gonna give you a slightly roundabout answer and then a direct answer. For me, when I when I think now I about kind of almost a full picture of like a theology of suffering that I've created over my my 40 years, I think that it's really easy for us in the church to say when we think back to the whatever way it is that we've suffered in our lives and see that God's done something good in it, be able to look back and be like, man, I wouldn't trade that for anything because I saw God do this thing in me. I mean, that's really beautiful. And I'm not necessarily saying that like people shouldn't feel that, but I do think it's a almost like it's like a rose-colored glasses to like brokenness. Um, and we were we were created for wholeness, and so it's fair that brokenness sucks and that it's awful. And if I'm honest with you, like while I'm so grateful for all the things that the Lord has done, if I could trade some of these diseases, if I could trade some of my suffering, for goodness sakes, I would totally do that. Like the Lord can refine me in a lot of other ways, you know. But what I would say rather instead is what I can tell you is in all of my sufferings, is God has never wasted them. And to me, that is so much more beautiful than trying to say, I'm glad that they happened, because I'm not I'm not glad that the world is broken. Like God didn't intend for our bodies to be this way when He created humanity, you know, but the entrance of sin into the world and brokenness and death is what is what creates this kind of suffering. And so I feel really firmly that yeah, I don't I don't want brokenness, but God's never wasted a single bit of it. And so I'm so grateful for that. And so I get this like front row seat of seeing God do much with my little, of God taking a really broken human. And getting to like impact other people. And it's it's his story entirely. And so I consider myself very, very lucky that I get this front row seat. But yeah, so to that end, as you think through, like, man, what does all of this then mean for my life now? I say is God is not gonna waste any season of your life. So this season where it's grieving and it's learning, like, how do I, how do I manage, how do I move forward? Whether it's future seasons where your body, your illnesses, everything else in your life looks different, he will never waste any of them. He'll never waste the love and passion that you have for him, he'll never waste the gifts that he's given you. What we have to be is open-handed, willing to follow where he's leading us. And that's why I think, and then this that intimacy, like stay in communication with him, when we're willing to talk to him, he has really great plans for us. So, you know, in perspectives, when we're talking about specifically, especially how do we engage in reaching the nations, we talk about these practices and disciplines. But so especially for the practices, we talk about going, sending, welcoming, and mobilizing. And so, like, what does it look like to engage in any of these or all of these at different seasons of your life? What could that potentially look like? And to be honest with you, I think anybody, whether they have chronic illness, whether they are a stay-at-home mom and they have like five kids under five and life is crazy, you know, or whether you're a business person and you travel every week, that the Lord, the Lord has a way for you to be a part of what he's doing, you know. So again, so if I'm if I'm speaking kind of within this idea of engagement in pursuing after like God's purpose of seeing the nations come to glorify him, which I think really this is true for everybody. Like going, I think is that more obvious one, you know, like you can, you can go overseas or you can work cross-culturally right where you're at. And for some of us, that looks like short-term trips, and for some of us, that looks a lot longer. And again, I think there's seasons, like this is a season where I get to do more short-term stuff. And I pray that maybe there still is an opportunity later down the road where I could do something longer. You never know. So I try not to close the book on it, but I can find peace in the season that he has me in. Sending is a sweet one. I love getting to send. We think often financially. And so, like for some of us, like that, we're like, man, I don't necessarily have time, but I have money that I can very purposefully and strategically give to engaging in the building of the church. But also, I can just be like a really committed sender. So, like, I have a friend who does ministry in Lebanon, and she has a core group of women that she connects with. Man, sometimes it's daily, depending on how hard things are. Sometimes it's weekly, where she can be like, guys, I need you to pray for me on this. I'm walking into this difficult conversation, or if you've kept up at all with all the things that have gone on with Lebanon the last few years, they had a giant explosion a few years ago. And then the country's just honestly been in massive turmoil ever since. And so there has been just a huge influx of need. So for her to know that she has us as support, or even like we've even helped to put on fundraisers for her and for the clinic that she that she has in Lebanon to help support the work that she's doing. Like, but we get to be a part of sending her well, remembering her well. We'll send her. I actually have been to Lebanon and I've gone with because you can't actually just send a package of stuff to Lebanon, it won't make it to you. Uh sending it to you. So if we want to get medication to her for her clinic, we have to get it here, put it all in a suitcase, and then one of us has to fly to Lebanon. So we gathered all the stuff, all the things that she needed, all this, you know, Tylenol and you know, things like that. Filled up some suitcases, traveled to Lebanon, brought them to her, enjoyed a few days with her in Lebanon, and then flew home. Wow. So sending can look like a lot of things. Welcoming. Yeah. I live in a part of Chicago that's incredibly multicultural, multi-ethnic. We love specifically, again, like I have a heart then for advocating for the vulnerable. You know, I think that's something that the Lord's really borne out of me, especially out of chronic illness. And refugees are amongst the most vulnerable people in the world and the people that I think just need most desperately to be loved and welcomed well. And so I love that like not only do we get to do that, but we get to be the hands and feet of Jesus in doing that. And so I have a huge passion to engage with refugees. And guess what? I can be sick with any disease, you know, and I can find a way to engage in that. And also, my kids can be a part of that with me, which is super cool. My daughter, when she was younger, she put on a whole bake sale because she really wanted to do something special herself for refugees. So she did a whole bake sale and then donated all the money to the organization that we work with called Exodus World Service. And she donated all the money that she made to Exodus to be able to help with the new refugees that were coming in, you know, or like oh, it's right, exactly. It was so sweet. And to be honest, kids are also the best icebreakers. We worked with a family that had come from Iraq, and we got lucky in that several of the family members knew some English, but in a lot of cases, you know, you're you're working with refugees that maybe don't speak your same language at all. And so kids are great icebreakers. My son was like three or four and really in the heart of his naked phase. So anywhere that we would go, he would like strip naked and run around and be crazy because this is what children do. And so he did that once actually with these friends of ours, and we were just like, Oh my gosh, this is gonna be crazy. And luckily, they thought it was the funniest thing in the world. Everybody's cheering for him as he dances and is crazy. Obviously, this uh the naked tactic has an age limit to it. Um, like four, four, five, and five years old is pretty much that that peak age that you can do this, but it's great at breaking ice, great at building friendships and relationships. And so it's been sweet to engage in ways like where my kids can shine, my kids can lead the way. Like we had this family join us for Halloween that year, and my kids took them trick-or-treating, and so they learned about these American customs. And again, like if I didn't feel good, I could still sit back in my home and enjoy their company and let my kids lead the way. Yeah, you know, and then yeah, the last one there is mobilizing. And really, the heart of mobilizing is we all have things that we're excited about. How do we tell other people about the things that we're excited about? And so perspectives is mobilization through education, but that we mobilize in a hundred ways. If you read a book that you really love that that hit you deeply, you tell your other friends to read that book, you know, or we watch a movie that we think is particularly powerful and we tell our friends to go watch that movie. And we can do the same thing with these kinds of passions. Like, I love to tell people to watch the movie The Insanity of God. This whole notion of like, man, is Jesus worth suffering? And it's beautiful. Don't wear mascara when you watch it. That's the best recommendation for the movie because you're gonna cry for sure. We we mobilize people to watch the movies that we like because they're powerful and we want other people to watch them too. So, like I tell people to watch a movie called The Insanity of God. You'll cry for a lot of it, to be honest with you, but like the heart of it really is man, is is Jesus worth it? Is Jesus worth suffering, persecution? And it's beautiful. So, again, there's a lot of things that can be true in my life, you know. I I can be sick, I can be really busy with work, or I can be up to my eyeballs in trying to do things for my kids, you know, helping to manage their lives and their bodies and all the other things. And it can feel like engagement in some of those other big things is just there's no space for in my life right now, or I'm not capable of. And it's a sweet reminder that like God has something for each of us, you know. So if it's I can read books and I can tell other people about the great books that I'm reading, then that's what I'm gonna do. Or like my my favorite story actually is I was I was teaching this topic to one of a class, and I was going from like table to table with the students and hearing their discussion on some of the questions, and we were talking about the idea of going. And the table had a lot of kind of people on the younger side, a college student or two, a couple kind of just very early 20s. But then there was a gal who was maybe 80, 85 at that table. And I loved hearing her take on it. She was like, she's like, Well, I go to the same church as this young lady over here. And it was this gal who I I want to say she was maybe a senior in college, something like that. And she's like, Lindsay, I'm gonna be honest with you. I don't think God has a season in my life left for going long term. You know, she's like, I don't, I don't think I'm gonna be spending the rest of my life in another country. She's like, but the way I see I get to support the going is she, this this other gal, this young gal, she's preparing to go to Japan and she wants to go to Japan with the majority of her life. And I want to be a part of like sending her well. She's like, so I've been studying, I've been reading books about Japan, I've been learning more about the culture. I've already begun gathering other people from our church and we're praying for her already. And she's telling me all of this stuff. She's like, because we want to be able to like understand what she's walking into, understand what it is that she's gonna be experiencing. We want her to know that she's being covered in prayer the entire time. And like it was so cool to see this woman see that the Lord has something for everybody, you know, like just because you're 85, like doesn't mean that the Lord has no intention to use your life in these really big and profound ways. And I also loved seeing the face of this this younger girl who's I don't know that she knew all of the things that this older woman was in the process of doing to support her. Because literally I could see her eyes start to gloss over as she's hearing all of this and realizing like she truly isn't in any of this alone. Like she has the church, the big C church. She has these people supporting her and with her. And it was it was so profound to get to just sit there and bear witness to it. And it was just a really, really sweet reminder. Like, God has something for all of us, and again, it can look different in each season of our lives. Yeah, we can continually bring that back to the Lord, you know. Like when I remember when praying for that discernment of like, Lord, is it the enemy stopping us or is it you telling us to go when he or telling us to stay rather when we did feel firmly he was telling us to stay? Honestly, like it was probably a little bit bratty, but he created me. I think you know this is my personality. I was just like, all right, Lord, I will, but I reserve the right to like re-ask you every year, you know? And I was okay, Lord, like is this gonna happen someday? And I don't do that anymore. Um, but he he I think he and I have a very open line of communication of like, Lord, if if the day comes that you want to open a door for long-term engagement for us cross-culturally overseas, man, like we still have we we have a desire to be used by him, yeah. And so in the end, it's not us dictating what it is, but we can move with great trust, knowing that like he knows us and we know that he won't waste the desire that he's placed within us. Yeah, and as long as we are just willing, he'll he'll do something with it.

L. A. 1:17:54

Yeah, thanks for that. That's beautiful. God doesn't waste any season of your life. I I appreciate you saying that. Yeah. Wow. Well, I think that was beautiful. Do you have any last thing, any last word of encouragement for chronically ill Christians?

SPEAKER_00 1:18:12

Or you know, keep keep at it. Find other people who have walked hard roads.

Community Support And Final Encouragement

SPEAKER_00 1:18:20

I ideally, other people with chronic illness, but I think other people that understand pain and suffering, because there is just a reality where we can feel really misunderstood by the world around us. Like, I I find I'm I'm an open book on any of my diseases, but I'm often hesitant to talk about them in much detail to people because it can feel hurtful if they don't care. And also I know that like if I'm just listing stuff off, I don't blame you for not being wanting to pay attention to me anymore, too. You know, like I don't want to be the person that complains a lot, but also I do need people to understand that I can just honestly say I'm in a lot of pain today. And so it's hard for people that don't have illness to know how to fully love us well in it. And it doesn't mean that they don't exist, and it doesn't mean that, like, you know, I like this was a big area when I got married. Like, my husband had to learn how he could best support me in it because it's super annoying. He has a body that works great. So like he doesn't, he doesn't understand, and so it took a long time for him to learn how to be that support, but it's possible. But having other people who are sick too, it means a lot. Build a community where you have people that can that can just get it, that you can just send that text to that says, man, please pray for me. Just a big pain day. It it's really, really meaningful. Yeah. Yeah. Feeling supported and knowing that you can be vulnerable with people, it goes it goes a long way.

L. A. 1:19:48

Yeah. Yeah. I agree with that. Absolutely. Find people that can understand and support you and and do your best to be that for other people too.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:59

Exactly. 100%. That's honestly one of the reasons why I'm so open in saying in the end, as much as I don't want my illnesses to be my identity, I am really open and talking about it because if there's again, if there's one person in a crowd that also deals with this, I want them to know that they have somebody they can come talk to. You know, somebody else that can understand it in some way. And, you know, even if you weren't friends before, you are friends now.

L. A. 1:20:27

Oh well, thanks so much, Lindsay, for sharing. Um, is there any way that we can support you and your work with perspectives?

SPEAKER_00 1:20:37

Oh, thanks for asking that. You know, I would give you a hard invitation. This is my official invitation. Join a perspectives class. Honestly, I I can't encourage it enough. And it's, I don't get like money for every person that comes to class or something. So it's not like you're it's like some sort of sales pitch, but perspectives was one of the most profound things on my life. And a lot of our alumni say the same thing. That just uh it's helped them better understand God's heart and their role and in honestly, their purpose for their lives is probably the better way of even saying it. So yeah, go to perspectives.org and you can find a class near you. If you are an alumni or you're just like, Lindsay, you're cool. I want to support something you love, you can always donate towards the organization again at perspectives.org. We always yeah, love getting to partner with people in any way that we can. But we we we want to see churches mobilized, we want to see individual people mobilized, yeah, to engage with this amazing God of the universe and this purpose he has to be glorified. So, yeah, perspectives.org would love to have you join one of our classes.

L. A. 1:21:45

All right, that was a good plug. All right, Lindsay, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 1:21:52

Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity very, very much. So thanks.

L. A. 1:21:56

Thank you so much for being a part of the Christians with Chronic Illnesses community.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:00

Please remember to follow Rate and subscribe to the show. You can also follow us on our socials at CWCI Podcast. And if you're interested in sharing your story, please email us at cwcipodcast

Ways To Connect And Support

SPEAKER_01 1:22:12

at gmail.com. If you are interested in contributing to the production of Christians with chronic illnesses, please see the show notes below for subscriptions starting as low as one dollar a month, or email us for a more direct way to give. This show is hosted and produced by Ellie Sprigg, and our incredible logo, thumbnail, and overall CWCI artist is Brianna Middleton. This show is intended for entertainment and encouragement purposes only. Please talk to your doctor before trying anything you hear on this show. Until next Monday.