How long can a body fight to stay alive when its very fuel has been stripped away?

I was flourishing in a kind of remission. My weight had risen from a frail 83 pounds in fall of 2017 to a healthy 135 in 2018. My energy felt limitless, so much so that my family and friends could hardly keep pace with me. Nearly every day, I was at the beach, walking the shoreline with strength and freedom I thought I had lost forever. I had reclaimed my independence, no longer fragile or weak.

But then came the devastating blow what losing one-third of my nutrition has done to my body.

The Pears.

Those Bartlett pears were my lifeline. They provided the crucial vitamins and minerals that sustained me, nourished me, and kept me in remission for years. Alongside my daily staples of plain organic Greek yogurt, an entire tub, and one whole plain, organic chicken, I consumed 12 to 15 Bartlett pears each day. This simple, consistent routine became the foundation that allowed my body to thrive.

Now, without the pears, everything is unraveling. I am no longer receiving the essential nutrients required to fuel, transport, and store the energy my body needs to survive. The absence of those pears has triggered a devastating downward spiral into severe health decline.

As a result, my kidneys started suffering, stones have formed, function is weakening, and my body struggles to regulate blood sugar and folate. I cannot retain sodium, which worsens dehydration. Malnourishment is setting in, 2025 my weight has plummeted back down to 87–89 pounds. My muscles are wasting away as my body consumes itself just to endure.

Too much protein without the balance of the pears has fueled more kidney stones. My body once flourished, nourished by the rich nutrients from those pears, a true superfood for me. To the astonishment of my doctors, my lab work used to always return strong and steady while I had them. Now, in their absence, those same labs have collapsed at a frightening pace.

The shock of it all hit me harder than I ever imagined. Something as simple, as ordinary, as a piece of fruit had become the dividing line between life in remission and a slow, cruel decline. The loss of the pears wasn’t just about taste or preference, it was about survival.

Each day without them feels like walking a tightrope over a chasm. My body grows weaker, my weight lower, and the energy I once carried so effortlessly now flickers like a dying flame. I can see the toll in the mirror: hollowed cheeks, thinning arms, and muscles wasting away as my own body consumes itself to survive.

And yet, the most haunting part is how invisible it all appears on the outside. To someone else, it might look like I’ve simply lost a few pounds. But what they don’t see is the relentless war happening within: kidneys struggling, sodium slipping away, sugar levels wavering, and my very cells crying out for the nutrients that used to flow through me with every bite of those Bartlett pears.

The doctors, once impressed by my resilience, now stare at my lab results in disbelief. “How did things fall apart so quickly?” they ask, almost as if my body has betrayed me overnight. But I know the truth. I can trace every decline, every symptom, every drop of strength back to the moment I lost the pears due to mold exposure.

It’s more than malnourishment. It’s a collapse. A downward spiral that feels impossible to stop.

But the question that keeps echoing in my mind, who is the one that will keep you holding on for what comes next?

How long can a body fight to stay alive when its very fuel has been stripped away?

Written By

The Original "Girl In A Bubble"