Osceola native fights back against rare disorder
By TYLER ELLYSON — OST news editor
|
| Billie Sweeney and her son Jaden display Gov. Chet Culver’s proclamation declaring July as Gastroparesis Awareness Month in Iowa. Sweeney is now raising awareness of the rare disorder after battling it for 14 years. (OST photo by TYLER ELLYSON) |
Billie Sweeney has been in and out of hospitals the past 14 years. From Des Moines to Iowa City, Rochester, Minn., and Winterset, the 34-year-old Osceola native has spent time in them all.
The culprit — gastroparesis — a little-known digestive motility disorder that damages the vagus nerve causing the stomach and intestines to quit working, eventually becoming paralyzed.
More common among diabetics and sometimes developed through heredity or as a result of certain surgeries, medications, anorexia or bulimia, gastroparesis causes nausea, a lack of appetite, pain, vomiting and dehydration.
But for Sweeney, the disorder is idiopathic — having developed for an unknown reason.
“That complicates and already complicated disease,” said Sweeney.
Beginning
Sweeney was a star basketball player on the state-qualifying Clarke High School team in 1994, and went on to play at Waldorf Junior College.
During her sophomore season at Waldorf in 1995, the athletic and in-shape Sweeney began losing weight and energy. Attempts at eating resulted in vomiting and flights of stairs became obstacles insurmountable without stopping to rest halfway.
After losing about 20 pounds and developing a lump at the top of her stomach, Sweeney went to a Des Moines hospital for a checkup. There, even doctors lacked the medical knowledge about gastroparesis to make a diagnosis.
“They didn’t think there was anything wrong with me,” said Sweeney, adding that common thought then was that individuals were seeking attention or inducing vomiting instead of having a rare disorder.
One year after first feeling the disorder’s effects, Sweeney was diagnosed with gastroparesis at an Iowa City hospital.
—————
July 18, Sweeney and her friends and family will hold the first-ever gastroparesis walk.
Gastroparesis Walk for a Cure — Walk of Faith will be held in the Winterset city park with a goal of raising money for gastroparesis research and increasing local awareness of the incurable disorder.
For more information on Gastroparesis Walk for a Cure, e-mail Baumfalk at jacibaumfalk@yahoo.com or call 641-414-5416. Additional information is also available online at www.gastroparesisawareness.com and www.fitnesssports.com.
• Read more of this story in the June 17 edition of the Osceola Sentinel-Tribune.
Comments
