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Anonymous Doctors Share Their Patients' Most Baffling "How Did That Happen" Stories

Anonymous Doctors Share Their Patients' Most Baffling "How Did That Happen" Stories

Anonymous Doctors Share Their Patients' Most Baffling "How Did That Happen" Stories

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Somethings in life can just never be unseen. And if you're a doctor or medical staff you see things that will haunt you forever on the daily. For most of us just sitting through an episode of 'Grey's Anatomy' is stomach churning enough. It is truly shocking when you notice some of the situations people get themselves into, either through a 'just life' moment or sheer stupidity.

Redditor u/ehudros asked Doctors of Reddit, what is the most "how the Hell did that happen to you" case you've seen?

JEANS WILL BE THE DEATH OF US ALL!

Lady with very poorly controlled diabetes and morbidly obese came in via ED with a gaping hole on her thigh...like so deep you could put you're whole fist through it. It was oozing ridiculous amount of blood, so much so she had to be transfused. Her blood levels were rock bottom. It transpires she'd accidentally cut herself when trying to wriggle into jeans. Meantime, the wound just kept getting bigger and bigger, and she attempted to just sort it by packing the wound with socks! Single worst thing I've seen.

KEEP DANCING!

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Working in the ER we had some interesting ones, but the simplest and most intriguing one I've had was a man came in complaining about chest and side pains. After a few tests to rule out heart issues, we discovered through an X-Ray that the man had NINETEEN fractures throughout his rib cage. When I asked him if he had been doing anything dangerous he replied with "Nope, just dancing." Needless to say I'd recommend NOT trying to do leaping flops into the worm on repeat on concrete, which is the only way I can fathom this occurring. And no, he didn't explain what kind of dancing.

PAGING PSYCH...

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This was years ago. I was near the end of my shift and a patient came in, I can't remember what the triage said but it would have been something along the lines of self-inflicted laceration to neck. He was put in a room behind a curtain and several of my bosses (all senior docs with like 20+ years experience) were coming out of the room with the same look on their faces. Sort of like shell-shocked horror. We work in the emergency department so these people see s*** on a weekly basis, and they all just looked, odd. So I was like, right, I need to see this. So I put on a pair of gloves and went in like I was being useful (I wasn't). There was a young guy sitting on the bed with blood running down his neck, and some lacerations to his arms. I was thinking, what's the big deal? obviously he's sliced his neck across but it's not THAT bad. Then the nurse that was in there was like, oh, ask him to lift his head up. So I did, and all the skin and soft tissue in the front his neck fell down and exposed.

I asked him why he did it and he said "it was the right thing to do."

I don't know what happened to him because I went home after that but I assume he would have gone to surgery and then the psych ward.

THAT'S NOT A VASE!

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Doctor friend told me of a man with a flower stalk stuck up his [Urethra]. He was trying to give his GF a birthday surprise. Unfortunately, flower stalks have little angled hairs on them which make them easy to push in but impossible to take out.

THAT'S NOT TRUE.

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The human capacity to deny the undeniable is amazing. As a radiologist I've seen an 80 lb ovarian tumor, a hand sized facial malignancy neglected until it eroded an underlying artery, numerous neglected breast cancers ( eroding through the skin ). People will refuse to see what they really don't want to see.

DON'T WAIT TI IT'S TOO LATE!

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I had a patient come into the ER once with a tumor on his neck/jaw that was partially obstructing his breathing. It had been growing for YEARS and he'd ignored it. The only reason he finally came in was an old friend came to visit and was basically like _"what the hell?!" _and tossed him in the truck to come to the ER. Too late, though, his scan lit up like Christmas lights and he had mets all over the place.

THAT LOOKS PAINFUL...

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Training as an EMT so not a doctor, but in the ER.

Old guy shuffles in with his girlfriend both mid-fifties. He is holding a "Members Only" jacket in front of his crotch and wobbling in. We take him through triage to the back and get him on the exam table. His scrotum was the size a large watermelon. It hung below his knees and was easily 18" in diameter. Serious hernia issue.

Just a big oblong mass of flesh that had overwhelmed the rest of his nethers. I think every physician in the Hospital came down to consult on it. I mean every one. Cardiologists, ENTs etc. everyone made an excuse to come take a look. This was clearly an issue he had been avoiding for years. The prescribed treatment if I remember properly was to Kevlar reinforce his belly and shove all his intestines back up and in. They were going to transport him to a nearby by hospital for the treatment, but because it was across state lines he refused to go. So he slid off the table pulled his jeans up around his crotch, grabbed his jacket and his girlfriend and shuffled off to the bus stop.

It's an image you never forgot, closest thing I can relate it to is when Hugh Jackman is trying to carry the fishbowl between his legs in"The Prestige"

BEWARE THE MACHETE!

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Saw a guy who had a pretty blunt machette lodged perfectly across de middle of his skull, but the angle was unusual and it was like perfectly along so that caught my attention

Turned out the guy had (unsuccessfully) tried to murder his wife with the machete and later regretted it so he hit himself in the head with it. He held it with his hand, sharp side front and gave himself a whack perfectly in the middle of his skull. Thankfully the machete barely made it into the skull and since it was along the middle it didn't touch any brain tissue

THE MIRACLES!!

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End of nursing school did a rotation/internship in the OR. Large urban hospital. Get a call that the helo is bringing in a 17 yr old with a severe spinal injury. Call in the specialty surgeons and they get to work on this kid. He has C3 through C5 fractures from a diving injury. Docs work on him for hours with very little hope that he will regain anything below the neck. Once the surgery is over we are all exhausted but the surgeon wants to see what will happen if we wake him up. With respiratory standing by we bring him out of anesthesia. He starts breathing on his own. He opens his eyes and responds to his name. Holy crap awesome. For some reason i was near his hand. I saw a small movement. I said nothing. I grabbed his hand and squeezed. He squeezed me back. Mind you I'm just a nursing student but i yelled the surgeons name and said he just squeezed my hand. Surgeon called bull until he saw the kid raise his arm. The entire OR was silent. This kid should of been a quad for life but by some miracle he was moving. The feeling of seeing that kids arm move ia something that i will never forget. I tried to keep track of his progress but the last i heard he was killing it at physical therapy and had regained almost total control of his upper body.

MOTHER MARY!

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I once had a patient that got pregnant despite never having sex. She had severe vaginismus and was not able to ever have anything go into her vagina, but her significant other ejaculated onto her and apparently one little swimmer found an egg.

WELL THAT'S FRIGHTENING!

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Had a lady come to the morgue in pieces for several days. She had fallen off a catwalk thing into an industrial fan that had no guards due to a cleaning being performed on that area in a factory. They were having trouble finding all of her..it wasn't explained to me until 3 days after the first piece showed up so I thought there was a serial killer out there for a bit.

AXE ME ALL ABOUT IT!

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My friend is a doctor and worked in Africa for some time. You can imagine, the hospital itself was a house, you could also have a school in. If no doctor had time even the janitor would stitch you up. One day, two people came in, one with an axe in the head. Surprisingly he was still alive. When trying to get the operation prepared, my friend asked the other guy without an axe in the head who he was. Brother? Cousin? Dad? Friend? No, neither of them. He was the owner of the axe and just wanted his axe back.

I HATE SOCKS!

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Just last week I had a guy over 400lbs (BMI 60). He was a hoarder and kept getting cellulitis in his legs because his house was so cluttered he kept hitting his legs into things and getting cuts and infections. When he came in we had to remove his socks with scissors because he hadn't taken them off in over 3 months, his socks had imbedded into his skin and somehow become one (I didn't learn in medical school how that happens).

DEEP BREATHS.

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Nurse here. Had a patient come in due to pain in her chest four months after having a mastectomy. When we changed her dressings the site was so infected that I could see her lung inflating when she took a breath. She died a week later. Still don't know why she didn't come in earlier.

TAKE THE MEDS...

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Work in the ED as a medical student. Had a guy the other day who let a leg infection get worse for years and when he finally came in his infected leg was at least 4 times the size of the other one and was draining copious amounts of foul-smelling puss. If the infection had been seen earlier, he would have just needed antibiotics. Because he waited so long, he's going to lose the leg, if not his life.

People Reveal The Weirdest Thing About Themselves

Reddit user Isitjustmedownhere asked: 'Give an example; how weird are you really?'

Let's get one thing straight: no one is normal. We're all weird in our own ways, and that is actually normal.

Of course, that doesn't mean we don't all have that one strange trait or quirk that outweighs all the other weirdness we possess.

For me, it's the fact that I'm almost 30 years old, and I still have an imaginary friend. Her name is Sarah, she has red hair and green eyes, and I strongly believe that, since I lived in India when I created her and there were no actual people with red hair around, she was based on Daphne Blake from Scooby-Doo.

I also didn't know the name Sarah when I created her, so that came later. I know she's not really there, hence the term 'imaginary friend,' but she's kind of always been around. We all have conversations in our heads; mine are with Sarah. She keeps me on task and efficient.

My mom thinks I'm crazy that I still have an imaginary friend, and writing about her like this makes me think I may actually be crazy, but I don't mind. As I said, we're all weird, and we all have that one trait that outweighs all the other weirdness.

Redditors know this all too well and are eager to share their weird traits.

It all started when Redditor Isitjustmedownhere asked:

"Give an example; how weird are you really?"

Monsters Under My Bed

"My bed doesn't touch any wall."

"Edit: I guess i should clarify im not rich."

– Practical_Eye_3600

"Gosh the monsters can get you from any angle then."

– bikergirlr7

"At first I thought this was a flex on how big your bedroom is, but then I realized you're just a psycho 😁"

– zenOFiniquity8

Can You See Why?

"I bought one of those super-powerful fans to dry a basement carpet. Afterwards, I realized that it can point straight up and that it would be amazing to use on myself post-shower. Now I squeegee my body with my hands, step out of the shower and get blasted by a wide jet of room-temp air. I barely use my towel at all. Wife thinks I'm weird."

– KingBooRadley

Remember

"In 1990 when I was 8 years old and bored on a field trip, I saw a black Oldsmobile Cutlass driving down the street on a hot day to where you could see that mirage like distortion from the heat on the road. I took a “snapshot” by blinking my eyes and told myself “I wonder how long I can remember this image” ….well."

– AquamarineCheetah

"Even before smartphones, I always take "snapshots" by blinking my eyes hoping I'll remember every detail so I can draw it when I get home. Unfortunately, I may have taken so much snapshots that I can no longer remember every detail I want to draw."

"Makes me think my "memory is full.""

– Reasonable-Pirate902

Same, Same

"I have eaten the same lunch every day for the past 4 years and I'm not bored yet."

– OhhGoood

"How f**king big was this lunch when you started?"

– notmyrealnam3

Not Sure Who Was Weirder

"Had a line cook that worked for us for 6 months never said much. My sous chef once told him with no context, "Baw wit da baw daw bang daw bang diggy diggy." The guy smiled, left, and never came back."

– Frostygrunt

Imagination

"I pace around my house for hours listening to music imagining that I have done all the things I simply lack the brain capacity to do, or in some really bizarre scenarios, I can really get immersed in these imaginations sometimes I don't know if this is some form of schizophrenia or what."

– RandomSharinganUser

"I do the same exact thing, sometimes for hours. When I was young it would be a ridiculous amount of time and many years later it’s sort of trickled off into almost nothing (almost). It’s weird but I just thought it’s how my brain processes sh*t."

– Kolkeia

If Only

"Even as an adult I still think that if you are in a car that goes over a cliff; and right as you are about to hit the ground if you jump up you can avoid the damage and will land safely. I know I'm wrong. You shut up. I'm not crying."

– ShotCompetition2593

Pet Food

"As a kid I would snack on my dog's Milkbones."

– drummerskillit

"Haha, I have a clear memory of myself doing this as well. I was around 3 y/o. Needless to say no one was supervising me."

– Isitjustmedownhere

"When I was younger, one of my responsibilities was to feed the pet fish every day. Instead, I would hide under the futon in the spare bedroom and eat the fish food."

– -GateKeep-

My Favorite Subject

"I'm autistic and have always had a thing for insects. My neurotypical best friend and I used to hang out at this local bar to talk to girls, back in the late 90s. One time he claimed that my tendency to circle conversations back to insects was hurting my game. The next time we went to that bar (with a few other friends), he turned and said sternly "No talking about bugs. Or space, or statistics or other bullsh*t but mainly no bugs." I felt like he was losing his mind over nothing."

"It was summer, the bar had its windows open. Our group hit it off with a group of young ladies, We were all chatting and having a good time. I was talking to one of these girls, my buddy was behind her facing away from me talking to a few other people."

"A cloudless sulphur flies in and lands on little thing that holds coasters."

"Cue Jordan Peele sweating gif."

"The girl notices my tension, and asks if I am looking at the leaf. "Actually, that's a lepidoptera called..." I looked at the back of my friend's head, he wasn't looking, "I mean a butterfly..." I poked it and it spread its wings the girl says "oh that's a BUG?!" and I still remember my friend turning around slowly to look at me with chastisement. The ONE thing he told me not to do."

"I was 21, and was completely not aware that I already had a rep for being an oddball. It got worse from there."

– Phormicidae

*Teeth Chatter*

"I bite ice cream sometimes."

RedditbOiiiiiiiiii

"That's how I am with popsicles. My wife shudders every single time."

monobarreller

Never Speak Of This

"I put ice in my milk."

– GTFOakaFOD

"You should keep that kind of thing to yourself. Even when asked."

– We-R-Doomed

"There's some disturbing sh*t in this thread, but this one takes the cake."

– RatonaMuffin

More Than Super Hearing

"I can hear the television while it's on mute."

– Tira13e

"What does it say to you, child?"

– Mama_Skip

Yikes!

"I put mustard on my omelettes."

– Deleted User

"Oh."

– NotCrustOr-filling

Evened Up

"Whenever I say a word and feel like I used a half of my mouth more than the other half, I have to even it out by saying the word again using the other half of my mouth more. If I don't do it correctly, that can go on forever until I feel it's ok."

"I do it silently so I don't creep people out."

– LesPaltaX

"That sounds like a symptom of OCD (I have it myself). Some people with OCD feel like certain actions have to be balanced (like counting or making sure physical movements are even). You should find a therapist who specializes in OCD, because they can help you."

– MoonlightKayla

I totally have the same need for things to be balanced! Guess I'm weird and a little OCD!

Close up face of a woman in bed, staring into the camera
Photo by Jen Theodore

Experiencing death is a fascinating and frightening idea.

Who doesn't want to know what is waiting for us on the other side?

But so many of us want to know and then come back and live a little longer.

It would be so great to be sure there is something else.

But the whole dying part is not that great, so we'll have to rely on other people's accounts.

Redditor AlaskaStiletto wanted to hear from everyone who has returned to life, so they asked:

"Redditors who have 'died' and come back to life, what did you see?"

Sensations

Happy Good Vibes GIF by Major League SoccerGiphy

"My dad's heart stopped when he had a heart attack and he had to be brought back to life. He kept the paper copy of the heart monitor which shows he flatlined. He said he felt an overwhelming sensation of peace, like nothing he had felt before."

PeachesnPain

Recovery

"I had surgical complications in 2010 that caused a great deal of blood loss. As a result, I had extremely low blood pressure and could barely stay awake. I remember feeling like I was surrounded by loved ones who had passed. They were in a circle around me and I knew they were there to guide me onwards. I told them I was not ready to go because my kids needed me and I came back."

"My nurse later said she was afraid she’d find me dead every time she came into the room."

"It took months, and blood transfusions, but I recovered."

good_golly99

Take Me Back

"Overwhelming peace and happiness. A bright airy and floating feeling. I live a very stressful life. Imagine finding out the person you have had a crush on reveals they have the same feelings for you and then you win the lotto later that day - that was the feeling I had."

"I never feared death afterward and am relieved when I hear of people dying after suffering from an illness."

rayrayrayray

Free

The Light Minnie GIF by (G)I-DLEGiphy

"I had a heart surgery with near-death experience, for me at least (well the possibility that those effects are caused by morphine is also there) I just saw black and nothing else but it was warm and I had such inner peace, its weird as I sometimes still think about it and wish this feeling of being so light and free again."

TooReDTooHigh

This is why I hate surgery.

You just never know.

Shocked

Giphy

"More of a near-death experience. I was electrocuted. I felt like I was in a deep hole looking straight up in the sky. My life flashed before me. Felt sad for my family, but I had a deep sense of peace."

Admirable_Buyer6528

The SOB

"Nursing in the ICU, we’ve had people try to die on us many times during the years, some successfully. One guy stood out to me. His heart stopped. We called a code, are working on him, and suddenly he comes to. We hadn’t vented him yet, so he was able to talk, and he started screaming, 'Don’t let them take me, don’t let them take me, they are coming,' he was scared and yelling."

"Then he yelled a little more, as we tried to calm him down, he screamed, 'No, No,' and gestured towards the end of the bed, and died again. We didn’t get him back. It was seriously creepy. We called his son to tell him the news, and the son said basically, 'Good, he was an SOB.'”

1-cupcake-at-a-time

Colors

"My sister died and said it was extremely peaceful. She said it was very loud like a train station and lots of talking and she was stuck in this area that was like a curtain with lots of beautiful colors (colors that you don’t see in real life according to her) a man told her 'He was sorry, but she had to go back as it wasn’t her time.'"

Hannah_LL7

"I had a really similar experience except I was in an endless garden with flowers that were colors I had never seen before. It was quiet and peaceful and a woman in a dress looked at me, shook her head, and just said 'Not yet.' As I was coming back, it was extremely loud, like everyone in the world was trying to talk all at once. It was all very disorienting but it changed my perspective on life!"

huntokarrr

The Fog

"I was in a gray fog with a girl who looked a lot like a young version of my grandmother (who was still alive) but dressed like a pioneer in the 1800s she didn't say anything but kept pulling me towards an opening in the wall. I kept refusing to go because I was so tired."

"I finally got tired of her nagging and went and that's when I came to. I had bled out during a c-section and my heart could not beat without blood. They had to deliver the baby and sew up the bleeders. refill me with blood before they could restart my heart so, like, at least 12 minutes gone."

Fluffy-Hotel-5184

Through the Walls

"My spouse was dead for a couple of minutes one miserable night. She maintains that she saw nothing, but only heard people talking about her like through a wall. The only thing she remembers for absolute certain was begging an ER nurse that she didn't want to die."

"She's quite alive and well today."

Hot-Refrigerator6583

Well let's all be happy to be alive.

It seems to be all we have.

Man's waist line
Santhosh Vaithiyanathan/Unsplash

Trying to lose weight is a struggle understood by many people regardless of size.

The goal of reaching a healthy weight may seem unattainable, but with diet and exercise, it can pay off through persistence and discipline.

Seeing the pounds gradually drop off can also be a great motivator and incentivize people to stay the course.

Those who've achieved their respective weight goals shared their experiences when Redditor apprenti8455 asked:

"People who lost a lot of weight, what surprises you the most now?"

Redditors didn't see these coming.

Shiver Me Timbers

"I’m always cold now!"

– Telrom_1

"I had a coworker lose over 130 pounds five or six years ago. I’ve never seen him without a jacket on since."

– r7ndom

"140 lbs lost here starting just before COVID, I feel like that little old lady that's always cold, damn this top comment was on point lmao."

– mr_remy

Drawing Concern

"I lost 100 pounds over a year and a half but since I’m old(70’s) it seems few people comment on it because (I think) they think I’m wasting away from some terminal illness."

– dee-fondy

"Congrats on the weight loss! It’s honestly a real accomplishment 🙂"

"Working in oncology, I can never comment on someone’s weight loss unless I specifically know it was on purpose, regardless of their age. I think it kind of ruffles feathers at times, but like I don’t want to congratulate someone for having cancer or something. It’s a weird place to be in."

– LizardofDeath

Unleashing Insults

"I remember when I lost the first big chunk of weight (around 50 lbs) it was like it gave some people license to talk sh*t about the 'old' me. Old coworkers, friends, made a lot of not just negative, but harsh comments about what I used to look like. One person I met after the big loss saw a picture of me prior and said, 'Wow, we wouldn’t even be friends!'”

"It wasn’t extremely common, but I was a little alarmed by some of the attention. My weight has been up and down since then, but every time I gain a little it gets me a little down thinking about those things people said."

– alanamablamaspama

Not Everything Goes After Losing Weight

"The loose skin is a bit unexpected."

– KeltarCentauri

"I haven’t experienced it myself, but surgery to remove skin takes a long time to recover. Longer than bariatric surgery and usually isn’t covered by insurance unless you have both."

– KatMagic1977

"It definitely does take a long time to recover. My Dad dropped a little over 200 pounds a few years back and decided to go through with skin removal surgery to deal with the excess. His procedure was extensive, as in he had skin taken from just about every part of his body excluding his head, and he went through hell for weeks in recovery, and he was bedridden for a lot of it."

– Jaew96

These Redditors shared their pleasantly surprising experiences.

Shopping

"I can buy clothes in any store I want."

– WaySavvyD

"When I lost weight I was dying to go find cute, smaller clothes and I really struggled. As someone who had always been restricted to one or two stores that catered to plus-sized clothing, a full mall of shops with items in my size was daunting. Too many options and not enough knowledge of brands that were good vs cheap. I usually went home pretty frustrated."

– ganache98012

No More Symptoms

"Lost about 80 pounds in the past year and a half, biggest thing that I’ve noticed that I haven’t seen mentioned on here yet is my acid reflux and heartburn are basically gone. I used to be popping tums every couple hours and now they just sit in the medicine cabinet collecting dust."

– colleennicole93

Expanding Capabilities

"I'm all for not judging people by their appearance and I recognise that there are unhealthy, unachievable beauty standards, but one thing that is undeniable is that I can just do stuff now. Just stamina and flexibility alone are worth it, appearance is tertiary at best."

– Ramblonius

People Change Their Tune

"How much nicer people are to you."

"My feet weren't 'wide' they were 'fat.'"

– LiZZygsu

"Have to agree. Lost 220 lbs, people make eye contact and hold open doors and stuff"

"And on the foot thing, I also lost a full shoe size numerically and also wear regular width now 😅"

– awholedamngarden

It's gonna take some getting used to.

Bones Everywhere

"Having bones. Collarbones, wrist bones, knee bones, hip bones, ribs. I have so many bones sticking out everywhere and it’s weird as hell."

– Princess-Pancake-97

"I noticed the shadow of my ribs the other day and it threw me, there’s a whole skeleton in here."

– bekastrange

Knee Pillow

"Right?! And they’re so … pointy! Now I get why people sleep with pillows between their legs - the knee bones laying on top of each other (side sleeper here) is weird and jarring."

– snic2030

"I lost only 40 pounds within the last year or so. I’m struggling to relate to most of these comments as I feel like I just 'slimmed down' rather than dropped a ton. But wow, the pillow between the knees at night. YES! I can relate to this. I think a lot of my weight was in my thighs. I never needed to do this up until recently."

– Strongbad23

More Mobility

"I’ve lost 100 lbs since 2020. It’s a collection of little things that surprise me. For at least 10 years I couldn’t put on socks, or tie my shoes. I couldn’t bend over and pick something up. I couldn’t climb a ladder to fix something. Simple things like that I can do now that fascinate me."

"Edit: Some additional little things are sitting in a chair with arms, sitting in a booth in a restaurant, being able to shop in a normal store AND not needing to buy the biggest size there, being able to easily wipe my butt, and looking down and being able to see my penis."

– dma1965

People making significant changes, whether for mental or physical health, can surely find a newfound perspective on life.

But they can also discover different issues they never saw coming.

That being said, overcoming any challenge in life is laudable, especially if it leads to gaining confidence and ditching insecurities.