WELCOME
This is Spoon Mouse, the blog for all of your symptom tracking and health journaling needs! I update my templates and printables whenever I find something new that I like, and I have a blog section where I talk about everything from the supplies I use to how I manage my symptoms during a flare. If that sounds like something you’d enjoy, then you should stick around! :)
The Struggle
- 🍓 Poor Mental Health It’s well documented that there is a high prevalence of depression and anxiety in people with Crohn’s Disease, but it can be hard to prioritize your mental wellbeing when you have a plethora of physical symptoms to put up with, too.
- 🍓 Feeling Misunderstood Whether it’s a family member that just doesn’t seem to understand what Crohn’s Disease is, or having a fellow student or coworker ask some questions that are just a little too personal, it can be incredibly irritating to continually try to explain your illness to others who just don’t seem to understand.
- 🍓 Being Isolated Turning down invitations to hang out, go out to eat, or do something fun with people you care about is never really fun. When you’re having a flare or even just feeling particularly sluggish, your symptoms secluding you from outside activities really sucks.
- 🍓 Communicating with a Doctor On top of explaining your illness to friends and family, you have to explain all of your symptoms to a medical professional. Even though they are trying their best to help, finding an effective way to communicate your symptoms to them in a way that makes sense to them can be INCREDIBLY difficult.
- 🍓 Nevertheless! Through all of these trials and tribulations, you have done it! Yes, experiencing all of these things is taxing on both your mind and your body, but look at how far you have made it regardless. Everyone with a chronic illness or disability is so strong, and if you’re reading this I want you to know that I'm proud of you.
Why Try Journaling?
- 🍋 Friendship Although it’s not a cure-all, journaling can be an incredibly fun hobby and way to meet new people. I’m sure that we’ve all thought about finding friends outside of meeting people in person, and this is a good way to find companions to bond with.
- 🍋 Mental Health The University of Rochester Mental Center states that Journaling has been shown to help in managing overwhelming emotions, prioritizing your concerns, and opening an avenue for positive self talk and improvement. “Positive Affect Journaling” was also associated with less depressive symptoms and anxiety after 1 month of usage, according to a study from JMIR Mental Health.
- 🍋 Physical Health In a study about patients with heart failure, it was found that the use of a symptom diary was actually associated with longer survival, and it was suggested that this engagement in self-care was beneficial. In a similar study, it was also determined that use of a symptom diary in patients with heart failure was associated with over a 50% decrease in both average length of hospital admission as well as average cost per case.
- 🍋 Communication Having a way to quantify and then subsequently address your symptoms comes in handy when talking to your doctor. In fact, a study of how using a symptom diary impacts symptom frequency and intensity, it was found that using a symptom diary “increased recall of daily symptoms and increased perception of symptom severity.”
My Service
- 🍊 Crohn's Specific I am trying to make a little section of the journaling community for people with gastrointestinal issues (Like Crohn’s Disease, Ulcerative Colitis, IBS, etc.). I have yet to find other chronic illness spreadsheets that work for me in the way that I need them to. They either are not what I need, ignore some of the symptoms I have, or just flat out don’t apply to me. I want to make the content of this website both fun and useful for people like me who have to go through all sorts of weird symptoms that can be hard to track.
- 🍊 Detail Oriented Like stated previously, there are not many Crohn’s-Specific journaling spreads that are useful to me to track my health. This led me to creating spreads to address specific issues caused by gastrointestinal distress that are often left out of other chronic illness journaling spreads.
- 🍊 Simple I try to make my spreadsheets as simple as possible. I don’t like adding too much information to track, lest it overwhelm the person trying to use it and therefore making it an ineffectual way to track symptoms. I also try not to make it more about form than function. By this, I mean that I want my spreads to look pretty, but not so artsy that it looks overwhelming or distracts from its purpose.