When Ann Manley was diagnosed with osteoporosis at the age of 23 she was told her bone density was worse than that of her mother who also suffers from the bone disease. This is her story
I WAS DIAGNOSED with osteoporosis when I was 23. It came as a big shock. Now after six years of treatment my bones are almost normal.
I found out that I had the disease while I was receiving treatment for an eating disorder, which is a known risk factor for osteoporosis. I was sent for a Dexa scan to check for osteoporosis. I attended the same doctor, Dr Moira O’Brien, as my mother. She told me that my bones were worse than those of my mother who was in her early 70s at the time.
I think that was the shock that I needed to start eating properly and going out and doing some exercise.
My treatment for osteoporosis took the form of drugs, including the contraceptive pill to regularise my hormones, supplements and 30 minutes of weight-bearing exercise every day.
Bone is a living tissue and is built up and broken down on a daily basis.
Bones need four things to function properly – good diet, normal hormones, the building blocks of vitamin D and calcium and, last but not least, weight-bearing exercise.
It took a while for my bones to improve initially, mainly because I didn’t take my medication properly. Even though I was training to be a doctor at the time, I wasn’t a good patient and I didn’t take my tablets.
Now I don’t need to be on the pill anymore because my own hormones have kicked in and my periods have started again.
I will always have to be careful with my diet and my calcium intake.
While there is a genetic link with my osteoporosis – both my sister and my mother have osteoporosis – my condition definitely developed much earlier because of my eating disorder.
I developed anorexia nervosa in my mid-teens, but it was only with the stress of college that it really came to the fore.
It took a couple of years for me to deal with it effectively and the diagnosis of osteoporosis was a big incentive to really tackle it. I realised that I was not just doing damage to myself on the outside, but also on the inside.
Knowing what I knew from my career as a doctor, the diagnosis of osteoporosis gave me quite a fright.
Around that time I broke a few bones in my foot from a simple trip while I was running to catch the bus. It made me realise that I had to behave myself.
Osteoporosis is a very common side effect of an eating disorder, but it is a side effect that most young people are not aware of.
While being a doctor helped me understand the issues at hand, it’s not the best job to be in to deal with any illness – six years of exams and 36-hour shifts make the recovery period hard.
Now I am working in the Mater hospital finishing out my general professional medical training and applying for a general registrar position.
When I told college friends that I couldn’t play tag rugby because of my condition, they couldn’t believe it. People find it hard to accept that a person as young as me could have osteoporosis.
I have become involved in the Irish Osteoporosis Society, trying to turn the personal into the professional.
I have also done a lot of work with older osteoporosis patients in St Mary’s in the Park.
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