The Zebra in the Room: Amanda McTaggart's Journey with EDS
Description
In this episode, Kim goes on a 6,000-mile round trip journey to Northern Ireland to meet our incredible guest, Amanda McTaggart. Amanda has a rare connective tissue disorder called Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS). EDS affects every function in Amanda's body and causes severe pain, dislocations, heart problems, stomach issues, sleep disturbance, lack of concentration and overall poor mobility. She has a long list of other severe conditions that are connected to her EDS. Amanda’s situation is so severe that she is at risk of rupturing any large organ or artery at any time. Her five year-old son Ethan also exhibits some traits of this condition. Despite all this, as you'll hear, Amanda is warm, bright and resilient. There are no specialists who can treat Amanda's condition in Ireland, so she must travel to London every eight weeks to meet with her medical team. Amanda's treatment is not covered by the British National Health System, so she relies on crowdfunding to keep going. Visit Amanda's Facebook Page (https://www.facebook.com/action4amanda/) for updates and her Go Fund Me (https://www.gofundme.com/f/action-4-amanda) page to help out. Get in touch at action4amanda@hotmail.com. Do you or someone you love have EDS? If so let us know. We want to hear about your journey and how Amanda’s story touched you. You can use the Anchor app to leave us an audio message. Or, use your phone’s voice memo app to record a message and email it to us at healingisinyourhands@gmail.com. We’d love to hear from you, and you may hear yourself on a future episode of Healing is in Your Hands. Production of Healing is in Your Hands is by Andrea Muraskin with musical interludes by Craig Norton. Our meditative moment this time is by Nicole Thorp. Erik Harris will be back next episode! Follow us on all our social platforms: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and on Snapchat at Feral20 and Earthwalker11