Rachel takes the plunge to raise disease awareness
Funds raised will help Addison’s group
Laura Maxwell editor@argyllshireadvertiser.co.uk Rachel Bolwell is joining The Great Scottish Swim to raise awareness of Addison’s disease.
A medical student from near Lochgilphead, Rachel is swimming Loch Lomond to raise awareness of the symptoms of Addison’s.
Rachel said: ‘I only got diagnosed because a friend of mine was fresh out of medical school. I asked her why my skin was changing, thinking it was just a skin condition.’
Addison’s is a rare, longterm auto-immune disease that damages the adrenal glands in the kidneys, diminishing their ability to create enough of two essential hormones: cortisol and aldosterone.
Extreme exhaustion, depression, dark patches on the skin and low levels of salt in the blood are signs of the condition.
Like a diabetic topping up on sugar, Rachel is drinking pickle juice and eating salt to top up her sodium levels.
Rachel said: ‘My papa calls it an addiction to pickled onions.’
Rachel was diagnosed with Addison’s in 2016 after she lost a lot of weight, started suffering panic attacks and developed hyper-pigmentation on her skin.
Undiagnosed, Addison’s can be dangerous.
Before her diagnosis, Rachel was due to go for an unrelated operation but doctors stopped her on the way.
She said: ‘They said there was no way I could go in. Anaesthetic interacts with the part of my body that doesn’t function due to the disease, so if I hadn’t known at that point, I would have gone into the operation and I wouldn’t have come back out.’
Today, Rachel’s condition is handled with medication and she manages day-to-day.
She said: ‘I function at my own kind of normal. It’s obviously not what everyone else’s normal is.
‘But I have to be careful of taking risks, because any stress will knock me flat – including emotional stress ... exams, paying bills, stuff like that.’
Rachel has found a bright side, however, saying: ‘I would say my life is much more normal than I expected and I’m able to do potentially even more than before because I’m less naive and more aware of my abilities and where to place them.
‘My priorities are in order. I focus on my health, family, friends and career and divide out my energy.’
Addison’s is rare so Rachel is swimming two miles in open water to raise awareness. On Saturday August 25, she will travel to Loch Lomond for the Great Scottish Swim, but training can be gruelling.
She said: ‘I’m doing a mixture of land-based and water-based training at least once a day. At the moment I haven’t hit two miles but I can do a mile in half an hour. But my dad is doing it with me, so he’s helping me train.’
Funds raised by the swim will go to the Addison’s Disease Self-help Group (ADSG), the number one charity for Addison’s sufferers across the world. They are known for creating communities for sufferers, holding conferences and giving out information on everything from how to give emergency injections to going on holiday.
Rachel said: ‘Their information has been vital for me and my family and friends to learn more about it.
‘Thirty young women die every year from undiagnosed Addison’s. If even one doctor could pick it out in one per- son, that would be amazing. I nearly lost my life to it several times, so I’m very aware of that.’
Rachel has already surpassed her £200 target, raising £310 for the Addison’s Disease Self-help Group but with six weeks until the swim, there is still plenty time to donate at her Just Giving page at justgiving.com/fundraising/ rachel-bolwell
‘Because it’s usually associated with other diseases, I wanted to use the health I have to help those who don’t have it.’