EPISODE 3

Importance of Friends When You Have POTS - Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome

Hello everybody it's Valerie here, back with another episode of Project POTS.

That is our official name for this project of me just documenting my life as a college student with POTS, so that people can see what it's like and the kind of factors and things that we have to consider.

So this week I want to talk about friendships. It's actually one of my closest friends birthday today, so that kind of inspired this video. But I know, friendships for a lot of people with POTS are a tricky subject.

It's very hard to find friends that truly understand what it's like. It's very hard to find friends that are willing to look past having to miss events and having to reschedule and things like that but it's not impossible.

For a long time, and especially in high school I thought it was just gonna be my family and my sister and maybe a couple of acquaintances, but I really struggled to find friends that bothered to stick around, bothered to be there for the ups and the downs.

Coming into college I was worried about finding friends. I was worried that once the friends that I had made found out that I was ill or found out that I had POTS that they would get sick of it and leave. But I am so lucky and grateful to say that I have truly met an amazing group of friends that have stuck around. That have bothered to learn about my conditions and ask questions instead of making assumptions and to go the extra mile.

They check in and make sure that there's food I can eat when we go to places. They check in when it's hot outside and make sure I'm okay; make sure I got back to my dorm all right. One friend even went to the emergency room last year with me. It's just something that I would not have believed had I told my high school self that I was gonna have an incredible group of friends that truly, truly cared for me with all of my illnesses, with all of my baggage.

So I really wanted to talk about that this week. Because I know it can seem disheartening when you keep going through friends and they keep leaving but I want you all to know that there are truly amazing people out there and whether that's physical or whether that's an online.

Support groups are an incredible resource.  There are people out there that will care for you and that truly, truly will be an incredible friend. And I want you all to know that I too am a resource. I am so excited for this project because I get to reach out and I get to know a lot of you personally.

I just want anyone out there to know who is struggling with friendships, who's struggling with any of the things that I talk about, any of my videos that I'm always here and I would love to talk to you and hear from you guys.

So I hope everyone has a wonderful week and I will talk to you guys next week

Go to Episode 4 - Managing Flares When You Have POTS - Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome

Download Valeries FREE e-Book:  A College Girl's Life Experiences with POTS