The Checkup with Doctor Mike - The Corruption Behind Med Spas And Vitamin Injections

Episode Date: February 25, 2024

Bea Amma went to a med spa a few years ago to receive a Vitamin B12 injection, and it nearly took her life. Since that fateful day, Bea has been battling a debilitating case of mycobacterium which has been eating her skin. It's forced Bea out of jobs and caused her to build up millions of dollars of medical debt. Today Bea is here to tell her story, but not just to garner sympathy, rather Bea is an advocate for systemic change, saying we must hold the currently unregulated med spa industry accountable for their spread of misinformation and dangerous, unproven health treatments that can ruin the lives of people they claim to treat. Follow Bea: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCf6G6HMFtsms0cmTsQg6KSw Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/beatriz.amma/?hl=en TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@beatriz.amma 00:00 Intro01:25 How Vitamin B12 Shots Ruined Her Life09:50 Brazilian Butt Lift12:35 The Injection Responsible18:07 The Hospital29:35 Replacing Her Doctor35:57 Posting On TikTok40:30 Mycobacterium / Antibiotics45:07 How Is This Legal? / The Cost57:40 IV Drips / Recurring Infections1:01:45 Her Scars / Dating1:06:00 Faith / Happiness1:14:52 Talking About It With Me1:22:45 Botched and Treatments1:25:00 Bad Advice She's Received1:35:00 What Advice Would You Give Yourself?1:40:43 My Opinion1:44:42 Call To Action Executive Producer and Host: Doctor Mike Varshavski Produced by Dan Owens and Sam Bowers Art by Caroline Weigum

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It's a constant mental exercise. Like, I have to kind of, like, force myself and pull this positivity out of me. There was so, like, so many days in the hospital, I was like, don't save me. I would rather die. So many days on independent treatment, I was, finding the will to live was very difficult for me. Those are the things that, like, I don't talk about super openly because I don't want to focus on that. I want to focus on how can I love my body more, and how can I finally, like, beat this once and for all?

Bia Ama is a 26-year-old social media creator who has a story the world needs to hear. Being a young woman who cared about her fitness and image, she was sold on the idea of looking fitter and having more energy by getting B-12 and fat dissolving shots at a local med spot in California. Little did she know, she would wind up becoming infected with a rare, drug-resistant, skin-destroying mycobacteria, leading to a three-year medical journey that is still ongoing. Throughout our discussion, she openly talks about her darkest moments, both mentally and physically, her call for proper regulation in the wild west of the cosmetic industry, and most importantly, her quest for self-love through post-traumatic growth. Please welcome via to the

Checkup podcast. I reacted to your TikTok. I saw that you went through this journey of developing scars, infections. How did that whole process start up? It was one day in April. I was 23. I wanted to go get B12 injections as like an early birthday gift to myself. I was new to Los Angeles and I was working a lot and I was like, well, I've gotten B12 shots before. Helps with energy and this place in specific that reached out to me on Instagram was like, oh yeah, we have this amazing compound of B12 and deoxycholic acid. And at that time, I was trying to become an up-and-coming influencer for like fitness and bikini modeling and stuff like that. So my appearance was

really important to me. And so I was just like, wow, this sounds amazing. What were the claims around those injections? What were they saying? Well, it was essentially Kaibela, which is a fat dissolver and that you also get the, you know, positive benefits of like vitamin B12 injections. The before and after pictures of their aesthetic Instagram did a really great job at selling it to me as well. And everything looked totally legit. It was in a salon republics. They had a really nice tattoo shop in the front of the building, like all glass windows. Everything looked super clean. Everything looked super nice. They had all these fake certificates posted. And I was like, oh yeah, this is this is going to be great what they did the DM do you or they asked two friends how do

they reach you uh they found me on instagram and then i got on their page and i was like oh i see you do b12 shots and then they were like yeah it's this amazing compound of b12 and deoxycholic acid and they were like we'd help you with your appearance in trade for what well um they were just like yeah you can vlog the entire thing and then i would get like credits if people came oh okay yeah and you were doing this because you were tired hoping that the B-12 injections would help with that. Yeah. I was being way too hard on myself when I moved to Los Angeles.

I was working a lot. I started a new job and I was expecting myself to have this energy that I wasn't going to naturally have. And I was overdoing the caffeine. And I think my body was taking a hit. And instead of listening to my body appropriately, I cared more about the aesthetics and and the hustle culture and mindset that I was pretty wrapped up in at that period of time. And I was like, look, I'm going to, I'm going to look better and I'm going to feel better.

so I'm going to do it. That's a promise that I think anybody would want to hear, especially in this day and age. Yeah. You said you did the B12 shots before. How did your journey of wanting to do supplement injections start? Oh, yeah. So I did B12 shots one time whenever I started a new sales job. And I love the way it made me feel.

I don't know if it was placebo or if there was definitely some real results there. But I did a YouTube vlog on my experience getting B12 shots. that video went viral and I was like okay people like this kind of content people are interested in this um and then of course like I had a lot of energy I was crushing it at my sales job and so of course you know I move here and I'm feeling low energy and I have a new job and I'm like I'm going to do that again and I'm going to vlog about it again but this time it went left sure the idea of taking B12 injections that initially start by taking oral supplements and then go to injections yeah I was taking oral vitamin B12. And I think this was too, like at a time where a lot of people were talking

about B12 injections. It was starting to grow in popularity. This was about like 2019 whenever it really started to grow in popularity. And that's when I first started getting them done. And I liked it. I swear, it really did help me feel good. I don't know if I was deficient in vitamin B12. That's a question I get asked a lot. But I think I've always kind of been like a sleepier girl. And so as somebody who's like kind of already on the tired side wanting to be this hustler and like, you know, live like a fast-paced life, you know, taking things to quote-unquote improve energy or improve metabolism, it was attractive to me. Yeah, I can see why that's appealing. Did you have any medical interactions with the health care system prior to 2019 to say like you were B12 deficient

or maybe having other conditions or not at all your clean bill of health? No, I would get hormone panels done frequently. I was a power lifter. And so that was just part of being a power lifter. You know, you want to go get your hormone panels done. Whenever I got my hormone panel done before I initially started injecting the B12, they did see a little bit of low thyroid, which was part of it. And then so they prescribed me phenormine, which I loved. Sure. And I took that for a period of time. And then I was like, all right, that's a little extreme.

It's basically like taking Adderall, I think. And so I came off the phenomene, and that's when I started doing the vitamin B-12. And I felt like it was a good substitute. At that point, were you considered overweight or obese or carrying excess fat tissue? Or that was strictly for added advantage in the... It was just added advantages. I looked great. I've always had a beautiful fit body.

I've always loved fitness. and I have never really struggled with weight or body fat necessarily. I think because of that, though, if I did, like, put on an extra 5 or 10 pounds, I would really freak out. And, you know, if I was to give advice to a patient and they would ask me if they should get hormones tested, if they should be taking these medications, my advice would always be unless medically necessary, more intervention is not better than appropriate intervention. And I think that theory for me holds true for supplements as well.

A lot of people ask me questions like, is vitamin C important? Is vitamin D important? The answer is absolutely yes. These are very vital for you to live a healthy life. The real question should be is having more of those supplements better. And we don't see that. In fact, when we see things trying to be hyperoptimized, we just end up seeing the backflow or the negative effects of supplements, treatments, et cetera.

So that's why my general prerogative in healthcare and seeing how things can go wrong, try and do less intervention unless we absolutely need it or we see a benefit of doing so. Yeah, 2020 vision looking back, I a thousand percent agree. I think I was trying a lot of fads and doing a lot of things just because I wanted more. I wanted better. I wanted like this self-improvement. And it was kind of like throwing shit out of board and hoping that it sticks and just like waiting to see like what was the right solution instead of.

of going for a more like targeted approach and looking back to I think I was just achieving or I was trying to achieve this feeling that maybe was unrealistic. So yeah and again it was kind of like you know you see a lot of like the hustle culture and you know stuff like that on on social media and like seven hours of sleep is too much get out of bed you lazy stuff and it's like oh my gosh and you know be careful what you're listening to because I was also a victim of that stuff. And had I just listened to my body and been a little bit more kind to myself, I probably wouldn't have gotten myself in this situation in the first place.

What was your relationship with your peers, perhaps in the lifting space or in the fitness community? Were they also doing things like this? Was this commonplace? Yeah. If anything, I would say being around like a lot of influencers and the people that I was around at that point in time, too, like getting stuff done. was also popular to, like, liposuction and, you know, argumentations. But I also think, like, liposuction is probably the safer route to go also looking back.

I don't want to, like, encourage or say that getting work done or anything like that is not okay. I feel very neutral about it now. Obviously, I understand the risks on a very different level. But, yeah, I think I've been around several people who have. gotten tweaks and little, you know, things done to them to make them look better. And I wanted to also do the same. My nephews, actually, who were maybe 15 at the time, they were asking, are all influencers buts fake? That was like their big thing. And the answer I gave them, I kind of want you to fact check me, given the fact that you're in this community. I said that so much of it

is either visually enhanced through Photoshop, Face-Tune, what have you, angles, photography tricks, or plastic surgery slash injections. Yeah. Do you believe that that to be the case? Yeah. Angles is number one, of course. Just get the right angle. You know, a 0.5 can do a lot for you.

Yeah, angles for sure, Photoshop would be second. And then, yeah, I mean, nowadays, when you have things like sculptra and you can do the, injections they have now i think they're FDA approved who knows these days but um you can get the um injections um in the hips to have you know um not the hip dips which is like a problem for a lot of people um nowadays or just a little bit of fat grafting you know take out a little fat here and put it in here and and um they're minor and relatively easy plastic surgeries to have done and i i mean they're popular and it's nothing wrong with people that get them but also like I do think if you're getting something done and you're this social media influencer,

you have a following or an impact on people. It's better to be honest about that. There was actually an influencer in specific that I really looked up to. And she had a totally unrealistic body. And I wanted to look like her pretty badly. And it was just kind of unrealistic for me to do that without getting anything done. And, you know, I have to be honest with myself and with others and admit that those things did convoluted my mind and my own personal image that I had with myself going into, you know, having these

really high expectations. Yeah. I think now that things are so available via Snapchat and TikTok and people are able to see surgeons doing some of the procedures, they think that they're incredibly safe. Yeah. And, you know, safe is a subjective word. It depends who's saying safe and what they mean by safe. So for example, doing a BBL, which is so popular in the community these days, has a one and three thousand risk of having a fatty embolism. And that's like literally a piece of fat from the bone, being transferred, I mean, not from the bone, going into your artery or in your vein, traveling up to your heart, landing in your lungs. This is a fatal condition. Well, I know 20 girls who were also infected with mycobacterium thanks to their surgeon within a one week's time.

And yeah, all of them are on treatment right now. Same treatment regimen that I had to do. Same doctor infected all 20 of them. Well, let's get into that. So you came in. You were interested in this treatment that they offered you via Instagram. And they obviously knew what they were doing and who their targeted demo was by reaching out to you. They send you the message. You come in and take me through there in real time. Yeah. So I come in. I start getting the injections. And I left later that night. And within 24 hours, I have extreme chills. I start running a fever. And I have really severe brain. brain fog. I was thinking maybe my immune system was just low or, you know, I didn't think like anything severe of it. Sure, your brain doesn't go to like the worst case scenario. Yeah, exactly. It's like I have a

cold. I remember I had a date the following night actually and I'm driving. Well, I'm on the date and then I'm like, I'm so sorry. Like I feel really bad right now. I have to go. So I left and then I'm driving down the 101 and I'm just like shaking. I'm like, oh my God, I think I'm going to have to pull over. And I'm new to L.A. I'm like, you know, driving in L.A. traffic was already one thing and then like pulling over on the 101. Like, I would never want to do that. And I was just like shaking. I felt like I was going to pass out. I just started feeling like really weird. Thankfully, I get back to my studio in time. I wrap up a bunch of blankets. I turn the heater on. I'm like trying to do everything to like warm myself up, take a bunch of ibuprofen, you know, standard things to try to like reduce a fever.

And I was shaking for probably like 12 hours. Finally, I get, you know, the fever to kind of go down after some time. And that was basically my last time even going to work, to be honest. I couldn't really work after that because things just went downhill so quickly. So what ended up happening was what we believe is that the vials that they were using were actually contaminated. There was so much mycobacterium infection that was injected into me. There was no way that it could have just been like the materials at some point, you know, it would have worn off. But the fact that it was literally throughout my entire body and channels developed where I was injected, it obviously shows like the vial itself had to have been

contaminated to have this much mycobacterium infected. And how did you get to the point where that was diagnosed? Like you went from, you being having a really high fever at home, what was the journey like to the hospital? What did they think? They must have been confused initially on the outset. Oh yeah. Everyone was super confused. I, so I got the treatment done April 19th, 2021. I was at the ER May 5th. No one knew what was going on. They were like, well, it's not necrosis.

We don't know what to do to you. You're going to have to go to a dermatologist. And at that point, you had what symptoms? Oh, my skin was bursting open. So this is what happened. Within 48 hours, where I was injected, started blowing up like these nodules, this like very red inflamed tissue. And then it started hardening.

hardening and hearting. Then came like this burning sensation. So I would actually feel like this throbbing and then kind of like contractions because my skin was literally preparing to open. And so it was like the thinning of the skin, thinning of the skin and spreading. It was like fire throughout my body. It was absolutely excruciating. And then I mean hour by hour I would see like my skin kind of like thin and then all of a sudden. What did you think was going? Like what's going through your head in a moment like that? I thought I had necrosis because that's the only thing I knew that existed. And you did you contact the place where you did that? Oh yeah, of course. So what did they say? They didn't want to respond to me. It took them days for them to respond to me. Then they started

cussing me out, telling me I was a pain in their ass. Good luck suing us. We don't owe you anything. This is your fault. Your body's having an allergic reaction. This has nothing to do with us. So they weren't interested in helping or giving you guidance on what to do? No. Literally, the owner of the business was like, I would like to meet up with you in person. And I want you to sign this document saying that you're not going to sue us. And so I met up with her just because I wanted to see the document. And then I read through the document. And I'm like, something just told me, don't sign that paper. Oh, she was like for a refund. If you sign this paper, then you have to agree not to sue us. But a refund, didn't you not pay for the service? No, I did pay for the service. I would have just gotten credits, you know, for. Oh, for other people selling up. Got it. And so.

How much was the service, if you don't mind me asking? 800 bucks. So she was like, take you 800 bucks. And don't sue us. And then, and then so I look through the document and I'm reading there, I'm sitting reading the document. And she goes, matter of fact, I want to see your body. We're at a public Starbucks.

She was like, I want to see your body. Take off your cardigan. And I have open flesh like at this point. Like this is only like, what, 10 days later or something? I have open flesh throughout my body and I'm like are you kidding like do you hear how you're talking to me she's like I don't even know if those pictures were real I have no idea if you're faking all of this and I was like you're kidding like I've sent her multiple pictures of what's happening and and everything and and then she starts cussing me out she's like you've been

nothing but a pain in my ass um she was like good luck suing me my husband's an attorney you know just saying like all this stuff and I just handed her the papers I was like you know what you have a lot of hell coming your way. Unfortunately, that hell hasn't came yet. But yeah, I handed her those papers and I walked off. And then a couple days later, well, things started getting really bad. And what happened was as my skin began repeating that and spreading and I was just in excruciating pain, doctors had no idea what to do. Here's the problem.

The dermatologist gave me two options. he was like well you can either take doxycycline which is an antibiotic or you can take prednisone which is a steroid he was like um take the doxycycline first so i take the doxycycline nothing happens i mean everything is still spreading which now looking back we know that um because mycopacterium is multi-drug resistant it would have been an effective antibiotic had it been tied with at least four other antibiotics and it is um an antibiotic that my bacteria is susceptible to but now i can't even use doxycycline because this bacteria is so smart that it's like, oh, that's not going to do anything. It developed a resistance. And it can't even be used as part of my treatment

regimen, unfortunately. Then, because the doxycycline didn't work, he was like, okay, try the prednisone. I felt great on the prednisone. Of course, my immune system was suppressed. And for the 14 days that I was on prednisone, I felt like I was getting better. But unfortunately, the steroids on the back end were actually making this bacteria grow rampant. It was like putting the bacteria on steroids instead. But those 14 days that I was on the steroids, I felt like a normal human being. I was, you know, when I was sick dealing with this, I was sleeping constantly. I was essentially bedridden, putting on clothes, even just the slightest touch of my skin was like excruciating. And I was actually told to go,

live with my coworker. I'm new to LA. I don't have any family here. I don't have anybody. My coworker who had known me for a month and a half was like, all right, you're coming to live with me and my husband and my two kids because no one else is going to take care of you and I'm scared you're going to die. So she takes me into her place. I'm living with her. She's literally preparing my meals, helping me shower, helping me put clothes on, helping me do everything A to Z while being a mom. And then there comes one night where I'm probably like all my arms are completely open at this point my back started opening and then I had a few areas on my stomach that started opening my stomach was the last one to like really react badly anyways there was one night

where I was like I couldn't even eat like you know it's bad whenever your body is like don't even give me food I don't know what to do with it I was sleeping constantly and then the shakes and the chills started coming again I was like septic basically because I had so much of that toxin that bacteria injected into me and I started running a really bad fever and something just told me it's like it's time you have to go to the hospital like you can't wait any longer for these doctors to tell you what the diagnosis is because they had no idea i was in this like weird in-between phase just waiting for some answers that i wasn't going to get and the outpatient care was so unrealistic like for a case so extreme i should have had a doctor tell me to check myself

into the hospital a lot earlier but they kept on telling me to wait it off until they find out what was wrong so anyways this night comes it's like three a and I'm like, I think I'm going to die if I don't go. Like, I just, I literally had no idea how I was going to make it through that night. So I go to the hospital. They inject me with tons of morphine. Finally, I get some, you know, I feel normal for the first time in a long time. And not in like this excruciating pain that I was just like, I was like half dead, like living through all of this.

So I go into the hospital. I get checked in. And then they find out that it's mycobacterium. They put the, well, they don't put the pick line in immediately, but they start me on the IV antibiotics regimen. They start me on only three. And they're like, yeah, this is going to be good. Three to six months, you know, we'll be able to fight this thing and you'll be back in no

time. And things start progressing. And I was like, okay, I don't think this is working. I mean, my body just kept opening up. There was. Were you hospitalized that entire time? Yeah. So how long were you in the hospital?

From May until September. Wow. Yeah. Four months. Yeah. Really like three. That's still a ridiculous time frame. And while you're in the hospital, they're just treating you with IV antibiotics, multi-drug-resistant, capable antibiotics.

Yeah. You know, when I've had patients in my hospital who have a bacteria that they test positive for on their cultures that is multi-drug-resistant, they get something known as contact precautions in the room. So every doctor that walks in has to be really mindful about watching. hands, putting on a gown, all this up. Did they do that to you as well? Oh, they were super precautionous with me. It's, they don't want to play, you know, they don't even want to be exposed to the bacteria. Um, I had two hours of wound care daily. I had about four wound care nurses that would come in and help me treat my wounds. Um, I was sleeping probably 20 to 22 hours a day. Um, I would just, I would be on the hospital beds. They would come in. They would hook up my medications. They would run the,

the IV antibiotics in the morning and the nighttime every 12 hours had to do it um the most interesting thing uh was whenever I was in the hospital I was having such a severe like immune response to what was going on my body was really completely shutting down it was like I was experiencing rigamortis but I was alive my my joints and my bones were um so inflamed I couldn't move my fingers I couldn't move my knees I couldn't walk um even my elbows I had like the most severe pain in my elbows. I mean, I literally couldn't do anything. And I would have to call my nurses just to go to the bathroom. I wasn't even medically cleared to shower until November later that year. I had to have help with everything. What was your experience like with the nurses that worked with you?

My nurses were great. I am so thankful for the nurses that I had. I was completely alone in the hospital. That entire time, it was the most lonely time of my life. All the friends that I thought that I had or my friends and even so many family members like didn't reach out to me and it yeah like I felt so alone there was some there were some nurses that I think they knew that I just needed to talk to somebody sometimes um and I remember like one morning I haven't to this day I have no idea who did it but I was so sad and I couldn't believe that this was happening to me it was like isolating I felt like all my dreams were over and I wake up one morning and There's an art set sitting on my, you know, like the little hospital table and there's an art set sitting there.

And I'm like, oh, my God, who gave me an art set? This is amazing. And so art really saved like my time in the hospital and it helped me kind of like put my pain and suffering into something. I don't know who that nurse was, but like that nurse made the biggest impact. And I'm like really thankful. I would have sweet nurses. they would like bring me like ramen or like cookies and um you know they would like my wound care nurses they would stay like an extra like five or 10 minutes just to talk to me to make sure that

I had some social interaction and that was super helpful and then I had um one friend in specific who would like FaceTime me every day and so you know those those things uh were really helpful and it kind of like helped mask the pain of um what I was going through and and you know so you have like the physical side of like what I was experiencing you know my skin bursting open And, like, they would come in and wound packing is no joke. Oh, yeah. Woon packing is so painful. So, you know, you have the physical aspect of things.

My skin is bursting open, even laying in bed. And I had those mattresses that like, pressure reduced me. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. Those sucked because I already have all these. I know, but I already have all these open wounds. And then it's like, ooh, this one would like blow up over here. And then, oh, it was like, it was so painful the entire time. And then the emotional pain of it was, it was.

It was isolating. I felt so much shame because, you know, at the end of the day, like, this was my decision. This was, this was my fault. And I felt like I couldn't tell anybody what I was going through at the same time. Anyone that I did try telling, I was so embarrassed or they said it was my fault. And, you know, they were like, oh, you're overreacting. A lot of people thought I was overreacting. And it's like, well, I've been in the hospital for a month now. I don't think I'm overreacting. And so, yeah, it was, it was just both emotionally and physically. taxing. It was, it was insane. I'm so thankful that, you know, motivated for getting is a very real thing. And I think our body does such a great job at, like, blocking out these traumatic experiences that we go through. And I'm thankful that I was asleep for a lot of it. My body needed all that rest. But it was, it was horrible. But anyways, so, yeah. It's pretty incredible that of all the treatment you received. The thing that sticks out in your mind is the least medical thing, but it was most meaningful. Yeah. Well, when people ask me, do you think AI will replace doctors or nurses? It's like, no, you just spent three months in the hospital. And it's not like, oh, I remember

when the doctor gave me this one medicine that really helped. It was the nurse that gave you the art set. Yeah. That's the thing. It was the nurses that would come in and check on me. It was the there are some really good nurses I don't know why I'm getting so emotional it's like I mean you know why you're getting emotional this is a serious story it's hard to talk about but no there were there were some really great nurses they would come in and there would be like you're still beautiful Were you doubting that at that moment? Oh, yeah.

I had a team of about 12 doctors and my plastic surgeon. The only one that approved to work on my case because he had operated already on other people with mycobacterium. And he goes, you're never going to be able to wear a bikini ever again. And I'm sitting there, like, confused. I was like, what do you mean? My skin's not going to heal. And he was like, no, you're going to look like you have monkey pox for the rest of your life. What the?

And he was like, give up on your influencer. dreams like those days are gone and so I'm sitting there was he trying to be no he was he was trying to be funny he like had a little chuckle he was like it's always going to look like you had monkey pox and he's said this to me on three different occasions like even post op he said this to me too um it it's something he's repeated several times but yeah being told by like my doctor you know when I'm like two months in like give up on your influencer dreams like give up on ever wearing a bikini again, give up on, you know, these things that I had wanted essentially since graduating college. It was hard to hear. But I took it as advice. I took, I took his advice and I listened to it.

And I was just like, all right, well, I'm just going to go into hiding. And that's what I did. If you could, if I can give you the power to go back and change something about your hospital state, not from your actions, but from replacing a employee, replacing a part of the experience, what would you try to eliminate or fix? ID doctor my first infectious disease what happened in that interaction um my story includes a lot of like having to advocate yourself and and unfortunately like I was telling my doctor like I'm telling you that this is not working I'm telling you that this is not doing anything to the bacteria like I feel I feel the contractions constantly it was like my skin was giving birth to this disease I swear that's

the only way I can explain the pain that I was going through and she was like no I I already have you on four. You're good. I already have you on four. And I was like, I need second opinions. So we got Dr. Chuck Daly. He's the Jewish national head of myocacterium. Finally get him in on my case. And then they ended up switching out my doctors. They're like, you know what? You weren't listening to her actually. And this isn't doing anything. It was not working at all. If anything, it was just creating drug resistance. And I was so mad at her for not listening, especially like woman to woman. Like, why didn't you listen to me? Like, you saw my skin opening up, you saw the pain that I was in every single day and you didn't

think to like increase the dose of medications that I was on. And once they gave me my new ID doctor, things started to really improve. Unfortunately, though, what ended up happening was I had to take amicason. Amicason is a really aggressive drug. And lots of side effects. Lots of side effects. So I have permanent hearing loss, 30% in my right ear, and I'll live with the tinnitus for the rest of my life. Losing my hearing was hard, and I knew that I was going to have to sacrifice a good amount of my hearing if I wanted to beat this. And so every week in the hospital, the audiologist would come in. She would do my hearing tests, and every week it was just like watching my hearing drop. And every day the ringing got louder in my ears.

And I'm like, how do I live with this? I mean, people kill themselves because of it because they hate just living in this mind with this constant, like, shh, you know, screeching and sometimes it just feels like your ears were bleeding too. It was really painful. And when people would talk near me, I'd be like, please just shut up. It was excruciating. The whole thing was just horrible. But I kind of at that point, I had, you know, this mindset. I was like, if I have to lose my hearing to get over this, then like, that's what I will do. And that's what I did. But we did pull my off of the amicase and in time for me to only have the tinnitus in one ear constantly and then I have intermittent tinnitus in my left ear and it's it's not horrible like you know I never talk on the phone like with this ear or like if I'm talking to someone I make sure that they're on my left side and so you know it's like small adjustments that always kind of like bring me back to like this story like how this has truly changed my life in so many ways it's not just you know the scars and that I get to live with with the rest of my life.

It's like these other things too that like looking at me, you would never really assume. But yeah, thanks to the amicason and thanks to my other infectious disease doctors stepping in, we were starting to make some progress. So it wasn't really until like the third month that I started to make progress anyways, hence them letting me out of the hospital. Then whenever I was finally led out of the hospital, I had nobody, but there was a relative that actually lived about an hour away. And they hadn't seen me since I was 12 years old,

but they were like, hey, come on, move in. And I turned their house into a hospital. So I had my daily nurse visits, of course. My dad stayed there too, and he was my full-time caretaker for quite some time. And so he would come in and he would hook up my meds. I was, again, still kind of like just like dead the whole time, like asleep. I was only up for maybe like four or five hours a day.

And then, of course, my nurses would come in. They would do my wound care for me every single day, packing. It was horrible, and it stayed that way probably until December. So it took nine months in total for the flesh wounds to actually close, which means the bacteria was dying, obviously. But having flesh wounds open for that long, it was hard. I would accidentally bleed a lot. Like if I tried going out in public, you know, sometimes stuff would just happen. But, you know, there was also the like the joint pain and the aches and stuff. Like I remember some really beautiful moments of recovery for me was like my dad would help me walk.

He would be like, we're doing 10 steps today. We're doing 20 steps today. Or you're going to do two minutes on the elliptical. Today we're going to do five minutes on the elliptical. I included that video on my TikTok because it was really important for me to move my body. Even in the hospital, you know, the nurses would help me just get a couple steps in a day at the hospital. you know going through that it's hard to get out of bed in the first place and so um really thankful for my for my dad and for um the family that i had that did step up to kind of like help me through this

situation and um you know uh yeah it was it was hard i remember my first time like driving again and running again and all of those moments i had tears running down my face because i was like wow this is crazy like when you have kind of like everything taken away from you and you're like in a hospital bed like, ooh, am I going to die? And, you know, you start to like experience recovery. It's a really cool feeling. It kind of feels like a new life. That's how it felt for me. I had a new appreciation for everything, you know, traffic. I'm like, I'm thankful that I can even drive, you know. Yeah, we lose that sometimes in the day, day of things. Yeah. It really put everything into perspective for me so was there ever a time that the doctors were concerned sending you home about

the spreading of the infection to your loved ones no because they would also have to have like open flesh it would have to be like open flesh to open flush type of transfer um so they weren't they weren't really too concerned about that but everyone again super precautionous they would put on the yellow coats and three pairs of gloves. No, they were super careful when dealing with me when dealing with my wound care and stuff. And they weren't really worried about that. And then at what point did you decide to now take the advocacy past health care and start advocating for what should happen to this facility that started all this for you? It took like two years. I just now started, really with all of that probably June of 2023.

I think December, no, January of 2020 is whenever I started to kind of like put my story out there. What made you do that? I'm curious because a lot of people would be very closed in and worried about it. Oh, it was the hardest thing in the world. I had a lot of people in my ear like, girl, you should, you know, you should put this out there. you should upload this on TikTok, share your story, get your story out there. And I was so terrified. I was like, I can't even look at myself in the mirror without crying. I cannot imagine other people even looking at me or I can't even put the graphic photos like on TikTok. Like my stuff will get

flagged. I mean, everything was literally open flesh. Like every scar that you see was once a whole. Like I was able to put my fist in my back. Like that's how open like some of these areas were. and it's like it is so ugly and disgusting to look at truly i i was terrified of sharing my story i didn't want anyone to understand what i was going through i just wanted to stay hidden i wanted to disappear even finding the will to live throughout this entire experience has been very difficult like waking up and doing my meds myself for the you know year after i was independent was still extremely difficult. So sharing any of those things with people who were not close to me and that I knew were non-judgmental was about all I could do. And then one day,

one of my influencer friends was just like, bea, you can help so many people. You need to talk about this. And I had this like overwhelming like discernment and feeling like also too like growing in my heart to talk about it. Because this is what I wanted to do. you anyways. You know, I have always loved content creation. I love social media. I love the science behind it, truly, you know, I'm sure you can understand as well. You know, you do this because you love it because it's fun talking to people and sharing stories and stuff. And so this feeling started really growing inside of me. And I was like, okay, well, I'm going to make a story kind of like explaining a day in the life. And I opened it up as a, it was my

TikTok where I was like, I'm 24 years old and over $2 million deep in medical bills. And before I put that video out there, I prayed and I was like, God, like, if this is meant for me, can you just please give me a sign? Because I'm so scared right now and that video got 1.6 million views. So I took that as my sign. I was like, okay, God, I guess this is what you want me to do. I guess you want me to share my story. And ever since I started taking my story seriously and with the intention of helping others and impacting others for a more positive message, um, I'm I've had nothing but positive feedback. In my head, before I started sharing my story,

I thought that people were going to say, this is your fault, you're disgusting, your body looks terrible, you know, saying mean comments, I haven't received really any of that. I've received nothing but an outpour of love. I've received nothing but an outpour of people saying, you know, seeing you clean your room and still plugged up to your medications motivates me to get off my ass

and do something productive. or seeing you work out while fighting this disease has motivated me to respect my body more and I'm going to go to the gym today or, you know, a lot of people who struggle with body image, self-worth and accepting the bodies that they're in, it's like if I can accept my body and every day I look in the mirror and I see like every scar symbolizes like those days in the hospital and what these people did to me and the unfairness and the lack of justice involved in all of this. Like if I can share that like through my body and share my story with people and help them feel better about themselves and it's all worth it.

It doesn't really matter at the end of the day like my small stupid insecurities and feelings like if I'm helping somebody else by sharing my story. And so that's kind of where I had to have a mindset shift to be able to be able to even share my story. And as you've started to do that, people have come out. I'm sure not just in support, but also sharing their own similar stories and horror stories probably of them with the health care system or maybe with one of these quote-unquote med spots. Absolutely. I have met a very sad amount of people that now are struggling with mycobacterium.

When I was in the hospital, when I Googled mychobacterium, there was very little. There was nobody talking about it. And I think a year and a half later, I came across a Facebook group of somebody who has like the most extreme case i mean she lost all of the skin on her legs all of the skin up to her um rib area and then even her arms it's all grafting it's insane um i couldn't imagine having that much of my skin removed but her her case was because of um liposuction and uh she started this facebook group um on on on facebook where over 365 people with mycobacterium come and they share their story of how they got it. And so now I'm hearing crazy stories of two kids who were swimming in the same lake, both got mycobacterium from the same lake. A three-year-old literally has it

in her lymph. Lymphatic, yeah. And then, you know, women who had breast implants, now they don't have breasts at all because they had to have their breast removed. Someone who was having ankle surgery, you know, a plethora of women who were getting BBL's lipo. really the majority of these cases are from plastic surgery. And then there's a lot of other people like me who were getting injections and they have gotten bacterial infections. Unfortunately, I got like the worst bacteria, but there's also so many cases like mine who have gotten more treatable bacterias. So I've been able to hear so many people's stories now and people messaging me like of all these things that I didn't even know existed. I mean, bacteria is to be feared.

bacteria really is no joke and I think like we kind of all ignorantly assume like oh yeah there's you know antibiotics there's you know technology and and everything and it's like we don't have the answers to everything actually if we had the answers I would be better by now it wouldn't have taken me this long to eradicate this bacteria in the first place so yeah I've been able to hear a lot of people's stories and it makes me sad to see that there's children fighting this Yeah. It's unique in this situation given how multi-drug resistant it is and how quickly builds up resistance and how the immune system responds to it. Not only does it try and fight it off, but also at times has an overreaction. That's why it's impacting joints and your ability to move, fatigue, drastic fatigue where you can't even get up out of bed, which is different than what most people consider fatigue. They're like, I had a long day today. I'm tired. This is a different fatigue. Am I right? Yeah. It's like I feel like I could fall asleep standing up sometimes. and and you know also really important to touch on is I thought that everything was going to be you know rainbows and butterflies whenever I came off of treatment not a single doctor prepared me for the health that I was going to experience after coming off of that 18 months of IV antibiotic treatment my body had no idea how to operate on its own my immune system didn't know how to fight off anything I mean I was at first off the candida buildup and yes yeast infection that you get after so many antibiotics like that.

It's like I've had these antibiotics fighting off every bacteria that you could imagine for the past 18 months. All of a sudden my body is kind of on its own to figure out and fight however it wants to. I was on antibiotics for strep throat for yeast infections so much to where I'm now allergic to die flukin. I can't even take it. And then the gut health problems, the hormone problems.

I mean, being on treatment for that. along with such aggressive antibiotics has ruined my body in so many other ways, I could not digest my food after. Like, it was, eating was such a pain. And then, yeah, there's so many hormone problems that I've developed because of being on treatment to where now, unfortunately, I feel more normal whenever I'm on antibiotics as to being without the antibiotics. Yeah, that's incredible that it touched so many aspects of your life, despite the fact that

we're just talking about bacteria, where most people think, oh, bacteria treatment move on, but it actually can be this long, very difficult journey. I know people have been fighting for five years. Yeah, that's incredible. I want to think about when you went in to get those injections, what was the process like? Was a doctor doing this? Was a non-licensed person doing this? Was it a clean environment?

What was that like? It was a super clean environment. It looked really nice inside. Everything was sanitary. They had, from my knowledge, everything looked. totally fine and totally normal. Did they give you guidance on what could go wrong? No.

Absolutely not. No. But do they make you sign something or? Yeah, they made me sign like a generic form. Yeah. Which you do even getting lip injections or Botox, you sign off on something and usually you sign away your rights anyways. But yeah, everything looked fine.

They had these fake certificates up on the wall. When you take fake certificates, what does that mean? They had no medical director, no nurse practice. practitioner. No one was a nurse. They didn't even have like the aesthetics license. So it was just a random person injecting you like off the street? Yeah, pretty much. How is that legal? It's, well, it is fraudulent, but there's no law against it. It's not technically illegal because there's nothing saying that you can't go open up a salon suites right now, go get you some Kybella or Juvederm and some syringes and start injecting people with it. Really? No. There's, there's,

Well, me is a bad example because I have a medical license, but yeah. But if you were a random person, there's no law that's actually saying like, okay, you have to have, you know, insurance, you have to have this. And the thing is, there's people injecting and doing Botox and lip injections and these things out of their own homes anyways. And that's a major red flag. Where are they getting the medications from? So, you know, California Department of Public Health and Safety, they did an open investigation on. my case. Here's the problem, though. When they were going to the location of the spa, they had to call to arrange, you know, a visit, which by that time, by that time, they had thrown away everything.

They had thrown away like the vials, the materials that they were using. They had gotten rid of all of that stuff. So when they start looking more into the investigation and stuff, they found out that what they actually injected me with is called Lipolab PPC, and it was ordered off of Alibaba. Wait, Alibaba like the Chinese e-commerce website? Yeah. So to me, it's like, as a business owner, you're consciously making the decision to order this brand, Lipolab PPC, is a popular Kaibela alternative, but it is not FDA approved.

Anyways. And like storage is important for all these things. cleanliness, sterility, all these things, but they're probably not being followed. No. And also, it's like, why in the world? Because tons of people, you know, do tattooing out of Salon Republic's, injections out of Salon Republics. Is Salon Republics not requiring, hey, we need a medical director or, hey, we need X, Y, Z for you to have this kind of practice because they could have lied and been like, oh, yeah, we're going to dye hair out of here. Okay, you don't really need much for that. no there was like what kind of proof did they have to provide the salon republics to even open up

their office space it i still don't have the answers to that apparently you know they're not holding people accountable but yeah california department of public health and safety were like um yeah they ordered this off of ali baba we have no idea if that was actually the real lipo lab ppc that was injected into me or if this was like a knockoff because you know that you can get fake juvoderm it has the same branding it has you know everything looks the same but it's not actually the same components. They're like knockoff components. And so that's, it's like, it's like black market cosmetic sales kind of going on.

And how did you get in touch with the California Department of Public Health? So when I was in the hospital, there was a doctor who was part of the California Department of Public Health and Safety team who was like, hey, we're seeing a lot of cases like this happen, unfortunately. And he was like, we're going to open an investigation on your behalf. So I was in the hospital I didn't reach out to anybody I couldn't advocate for myself anyways Even hiring lawyers was a hard enough of a thing for me to do anyways

I was already struggling just to make it to the next day So all these other things are like Oh did you do this and did you do that And did you do this? I'm like I was literally just trying to survive the first year Um TD Bank knows that running a small business

is a journey from startup to growing and managing your business that's why they have a dedicated small business advice hub on their website to provide tips and insights on business banking to entrepreneurs no matter the stage of business you're in visit td.com slash small business advice to find out more or to match with a td small business banking account manager so what was their takeaway from their investigation um that they told me that I need to get in contact with legislators and see if some laws can be made in regards to what happened because there's essentially nothing that currently exists to hold these people accountable. How is that your job? Yeah.

Like you're the victim. And the legislator. That's like the police officer saying like, oh, sorry, you're a victim of a crime. Like, you should hire a lawyer and get someone to charge. That's what I was told. That's exactly what happened. And even the legislator that I did reach out to didn't respond. No DA has responded.

I feel like... And you did end up creating some sort of lawsuit against this company. Take me through what happened there. Yeah. So that also went pretty badly. As soon as the lawyers found out that this place didn't have insurance, they were like, there's no money in it for you, me, or anybody. We got to dismiss this.

Wow. Yeah. And how is it possible that they can run this place without insurance? To film here, I have to have insurance to make sure that if the camera falls, there's insurance. California has absolutely nobody going spa to spa to regulate these things to see who has insurance, who doesn't have insurance. And again, it's just not a requirement in the state of California for businesses to have insurance. And I wish that cosmetology laws were not, like, cosmetology has advanced so much in the past five years.

You would think that there would be some laws being created to kind of, of like regulate how many med spas are being you know literally they're sprouting up like all over the place on every corner there's a because they just open them under a different LLC and that's it they're covered they close that LLC they'll open another one exactly exactly and so all the time people asking me well why don't you out this place why don't you do this why don't you say um the name of the spa so other people don't go there literally within two weeks of the california department of public health and safety going for their appointment investigation they moved locations And they changed. Yeah, they just change. And it's like, that's not going to do anything. I want to wait for a time where it is legally appropriate and possible for me to out these people because I want them in prison. I have so much medical debt. There's no way that they're ever going to be able to pay off my debt or the lawyers. Or my pain and suffering. Nobody. The hospital calls me every day. Hey, we need your money.

Did you have health insurance when all this happened? Thank God. I was under my dad's. I was, I was under. 26, so I was still under my dad's health insurance, which saved me. And he had really good health insurance. So what happened then? Did that cover partially? How does that work? It covers partially. You know, I think being in the hospital was a little over 10,000 a day. And then my treatment is $17,000 a week. Wow. And then it covers partially and how you've been paying the rest just on your own with family members. I know you have a go fund me, right? Yeah, I do, which I don't talk a lot about, but whatever support helps and it does all go towards the medical bills but to be honest like food and rent comes first and I haven't been able to work I had a job whenever I was independently doing

treatment I was able to get an apartment and get a job as a sales executive that's what I have been for the past you know five years I've been in sales and it was so hard managing being on treatment and having a job looking back, I have no idea how I did it. I recently tried getting a job again, and I abandoned my health. I was like skipping my morning treatments because I couldn't deal with the nausea of the medication while working or, you know, the vomiting and everything else that comes with it. And so I was just like, some days I just needed to be in bed, and I had to tell them, like, I'm sorry, like, I thought I was ready and I'm just not.

so you know I think it's just how does the billing department in the hospital deal with this when they call you do they are they like apologetic or are they like nope you owe this money like no they're they I owe them that money and they can keep on giving me notices and I mean it is what it is like you know they they're not going to throw me in jail if I don't pay the money I mean yeah it all affects my credit but it's like at the end of the day why does my credit matter if I'm half alive or if I'm struggling with my health, it's like, oh, don't you want to buy a house one day? No, I want to be cured. Like, I want to be better. Like, I don't want to, like, I have to, none of those things come before my health. Like, having a job doesn't come before my health and figuring this out first. And it's like,

if I, I don't even think I would be as far as I am if I cared about all those things first. No, I can't pay off my hospital bills. No, I can't pay off my co-pays. Every week, I have a new bill in the mail from blood work, from my home health agency, from the hospital, from my treatment cost. I mean, it's like, I don't even look at them. Wow. I can't. Of course. That's too many things to bear on your mind. I don't want to know what the total is. I make my $25 minimum payment so they don't send me to collections yet. And that's all I can do. But is it like it's in the six figure, seven figure range? I think my outpatient right now is like 70,000 or my my patient responsibility is like 70,000. But in total in terms of what your insurance? Three million. Jesus. Yeah. From a B12. Maybe two million.

Yeah, probably two point something million. The last time I checked it was you would think the health insurance company would want to crack down on this too. Like if they're insured patients are going in for these treatments and then ending up with a three million dollar case that would have never happened. They might as well spend 100,000 prosecuting this thing. Right. It's kind of wild to me that that's happened. So, yeah, my lawyers, I mean, no lawyer is interested in this. It's not just my lawyers.

It's any lawyer that I talk to. The second that I'm like, well, they didn't have insurance. They hang up the phone. They have no interest in speaking with me. And criminally, it's like, well, yeah, I've talked to some criminal lawyers as well. And it's like, well, there's nothing technically ill. legal that they did. Because there's no rules here.

It's kind of a gray zone. It's like, what do I have to do, sign a petition and get 100,000 people to sign it to throw these people in prison? Well, hopefully people watching this video will start sending some letters to legislators and being like, you've got to fix this. You have to do something. Because there's going to be more victims. Even when I looked up the situation online, I found many cases of this from cosmetic

procedures. And what's interesting that people don't think about, and it's a devastating, not just interesting thing about the situation is that cosmetic procedures are done on healthy people. Yes. These are not side effects because we're treating a condition that we needed to desperately treat. Otherwise, we get harms. These are healthy people getting a disease that they would have never had otherwise. Yeah, I was so healthy.

And, you know, thank goodness I was because had it not been for the healthy individual that I was, I probably wouldn't have healed or recovered the way that I did. you know there's people experiencing organ failure because their body just can't take more of these medications the impact that it has on your organs your kidney your liver it's not to be played with and thank goodness i'm a young you know i was 23 24 years old in the in the beginning of this i could have lost all my hearing i could have had my kidneys and my liver stop working it happens to people i could have you know had to choose between organ health or continuing medication to treat this bacteria. I didn't have to do that. And I'm so lucky that I didn't have to do that.

Because even if the age was different, you were 60 years old experiencing this, that could have been hit? Well, you know, there's a mother in Frisco, Texas, that just died because she got an ivy concoction. These ivy drip places, they're not regulated. Yeah, I've always spoke out against those. It is the most dangerous thing. I mean, the fact that they have these Ivy drip places like in gyms now. There is a kid, he was doing steroids at the gym. He had welps this big of flesh just being eaten because it was mycobacterium. Somehow, mycobacterium was in the syringe or the liquid that he was injecting. And, well, he already finished treatment and everything. That's another thing that's really frustrating. I look at other cases of mycobacterium

and they were basically off treatment within, you know, nine months to a year, year and a half and it's like oh my gosh here I am going on 32 33 months and I'm still yeah what's the status now where are we at now um so January of 2023 I was able to come off antibiotics um and that's when I started doing some laser treatments too for the scars and I thought that you know that was it for me I thought that we were good I'm like yay this is great I can turn a new leaf on my life and then that's when I started experiencing all the infections for other things, constant recurring strep throat, recurring yeast infections, gut health problems. So it wasn't easy.

And then comes June. And I schedule this trip to Europe because I'm like, I'm free. I deserve this trip to Europe. And then literally I land in France. And for some reason, I think the pressure from the plane made everything swell up. And I find three balls. And I'm like, you're kidding. and so as soon as I find them I'm like I know it's back and then by August they had become so large

and so thin I had to have them operated on so I had a surgery in August, September and then October and then because there were so many popping up I mean the speed at which they pop up and grow and it's painful too is unfortunate and so they put me back on treatment in October. I got my port put back in my chest. So I was on a short remission. It was really January to October that, so like 10 months that I was in this, you know, small freedom phase, which after being on the IV antibiotics for as long as I was, felt like heaven. It was awesome. But it wasn't easy. It was really, really tough. And then coming back on the antibiotics, six hours a day

so not as bad as it was and if I rush my IV drip I can do it faster I can get it done in like four or five hours depending on how I'm feeling so you're still in antibiotics yeah I'm still on antibiotics I still have a port in my chest

but because more balls have been popping up and they've been growing so fast my infectious disease doctor is starting to look at other options potentially that maybe this isn't mycobacterium and maybe this is a foreign body response and that's what's causing these granulomas to grow. Everyone disagrees. My surgeon, the head of mycobacterium at Jewish National thinks it's still mycobacterium. They think it was a

relapse in the bacteria and mostly because where I'm getting these granulomas are places that were not previously exposed. Like the whole, you know, flesh eating did not happen in that spot, whereas the spots that were completely open where my body was able to push everything out and then the skin healed over new, those are the places where I don't have any problems with, like, recurrence or relapse with the bacteria. These areas are, they're very deep into my tissue. I find this, like, painful little ball.

It's kind of like when you, like, feel a pimple coming on the face, and then it just gets bigger and bigger and bigger. And then the contractions start happening, and then the thinning of the skin, and then it bursts open, and then it'll just eat and spread. what's your relationship like with your scars now it feels okay so i've had some realizations it feels weird now looking back at pictures of myself before i had them now i feel like that that's me you know now when i see myself with the scars because i have a lot of the surgery scars too it's not just

like the scars from the flesh eating it's also the scars from the surgery and i look at them and and sometimes I'm like okay it's not that bad like it kind of looks cool or sometimes I'm like they look really good today um I've been fake tanning too which kind of like helps like the contrast and so that's really helped with my confidence um because you show them quite often on social media yeah and it's so cringe to me I'm like oh I can't believe I'm doing that but um I feel like I have to um I feel like it's like I have to force myself to love the body that I'm in It's not easy. This isn't like, I don't look at them.

I'm like, oh, my God, I love that I have these. No, I hate them. Like, but I love them too. Yeah, that's an interesting duality there. It's almost the same how some patients struggle with, that have scars, sometimes very disfiguring scars on their face. And they tell me their struggle when someone tells me they're beautiful, tells them they're beautiful.

Oh, I hate that comment. They're like, you're still beautiful regardless. Yeah, so some are happy because someone views them as beautiful. And then I have other patients who take that very negatively and say, no, these scars suck. I hate them. I've just learned that they're part of me and I accept them. Where do you land on that? Pretty in the middle.

I think it just depends on the day. I think I have days where I'm like, damn, like, you know, despite these scars, like the gym's been paying off or, oh, my body looks great. Or like, I'm so thankful to have, you know, a functioning and healthy body. So give or take, basically. It depends on the day. And then I have days like, oh, the two days ago, I have. like a whole hour long mental breakdown because I wanted to go to a party and my port's showing and I wanted to like feel sexy and show some cleavage and it's like, oh, this looks like so weird

and people are going to ask me what's wrong. And then I go in public and I've been exposing my skin. I wore a t-shirt for the first time ever like two weeks ago. And so I had my arm scars out and I had like a little crop top on and some of my stomach scars were showing. And I could obviously see the glances like people would, you know, look at them as I passed by. And so it felt weird. I'm still new to this, too, you know? Like, this is my first time really showing my body and I'm kind of like accepting it with time. It's been like a cathartic process. The more I share, the more I can accept it. When I didn't share, I hated it. I would look in the mirror and I would cry. So it's been a process of accepting them. But also it sucks. It's like, oh, I'm always going to

be different. This is always going to be a thing. They're always going to be there. I think, you know, this is just a personal thing, but like my biggest dream has always been to be a mother. I dream about being a mom. And I think all the time, I'm like, oh, my God, you know, my pregnant belly is going to have all these ugly circle scars on them. And then people are going to, I don't know, like I just, I hope that my, my kids aren't bullied because their mom has different skin or just, I get, I get thoughts like that. Like, dating sucks because then I, I feel like I have to kind of get like a different level of

consent and explain what happened and like, hey, there's a port in my chest and, hey, I have all these marks on my bodies. It kind of makes dating unrealistic and difficult, but not impossible. Like, I've done it. And to my surprise and to any women watching, I don't think men care nearly as much as we think we do, which has been really cool. So, you know, I'm not saying that like men's validation is like everything and that, you know, it's super important. But I also think you know, whenever I was in the hospital, I was like, I am never going to be lovable. And that's like farthest from the truth. That's great to hear. And also, I would say you have a very accurate and well thought out

introspective viewpoint on this because you're aware that there's a difference here that some people perceive you one way, but you're still open to the fact that, wow, people are not as judgmental here. On social media, you went out and there was so much positivity or you're dating now and people don't care as much, it's great that you're not blocking off the positive feelings from the situation because it's very easy in a situation like this to really just overly focus on the negative. What's your strategy on highlighting that positivity? Yeah. So there's a few. And just as a background, my degree is in psychology. So I'm already very blessed with a lot of these, you know, tricks up my sleeve that I've been able to use to mentally and emotionally, like recover and

prepare for things like this. So there's one, it's like the Beneker writing strategy. Andrew Huberman talked about it, but if you write about a traumatic event or a traumatic feeling four times within a close proximity of time, I think it's a week or two weeks, it actually decreases the sensitivity towards that traumatic event. So that's a writing strategy that I've used in my journal towards a lot of these heavy or hard to face emotions. So that's one thing that I've really used that has helped out a lot, journaling, just dumping everything into a journal, how I feel my emotions ugly crying at that freaking journal and just like getting it out. I'm really heavy in my faith too, and that has helped me so much with accepting this. And I can go on and on a tangence

on, you know, how having faith in something and that there's a greater purpose. And finding, purpose and suffering is at the end of the day a blessing. So that's that's part of it. And then two, looking in the mirror. So I just have to get really comfortable looking in the mirror. Hearing from other people like, you know, your body looks great or your scars don't look that bad. And people like recognizing that they're there and then saying like, you know, you look really good or I promise the way you see them is not the way that other people see them. That remark has helped a lot. People on social media telling me that my body helps them feel more comfortable about their body has helped a lot. So it's kind of just like an accumulation of, you know,

positive reminders that has really made the biggest difference. And I can look at that, you know, inversely as well. And I can imagine a scenario where if I looked at the mirror every day for a month and I said negative things about my body, I would have a horrible perception about what is going on. But if I look at my body every single day and I say, you know what, I like how my scars look or, you know, honestly, they kind of look kind of cool. Or remember that positive comment that somebody said? There is a nine-year-old girl whose mom commented on my TikTok and she was like, my daughter has some disfiguring scars from a kidney surgery. And I showed her your page and she said, wow, she's so beautiful. Maybe I can feel beautiful one day too. Comments like that, it's like,

I don't even have the words to explain. And so it's just an accumulation of positivity. I think positivity and gratitude at the end of the day are miracle makers. And you have to force yourself to do that sometimes, right? A lot of people think motivation comes before action. No. The action has to precede the motivation. And that sucks.

Trust me. I have weeks where I'm like, fuck all that positivity shit. I don't want anything to do with it. Like that is like so unappealing and unattractive right now. But then it's like working out. It's like you got to get back into the gym. Yeah. And you're allowed to have those moments.

Like you have to leave room for that. Because like if a patient came to me and they said, doctor, I'm sad about this. I must have something wrong with me. It's like, what do you mean? You had a terrible traumatic life event. Two years in the hospital. This is this is going to take a toll on anybody. If it didn't, that's probably a concern there of like, how are you not worried about

how this is going to impact you? Are you neglecting some parts of it? I would ask those questions. Yeah. And, you know, unfortunately, I'm a pretty avoidant person too. And so there's been a lot of avoidance here that has in some ways worked to my benefit and in some ways not to be totally transparent. When I was about 12 months in on treatment, I started smoking a lot of weed. And that kind of helped me really numb out from it.

And it was just a way for me to kind of like escape. And then, of course, whenever I came. off of, you know, from smoking, you know, marijuana all the time, um, I had to kind of like reface these things that I had been pushing off, uh, which I felt was a really interesting, um, experience for me because I didn't realize that I was pushing these things off whenever I was doing it. And then so whenever I came off of it, I, again, I would go to the journaling exercises and I would be able to face these things. And so it's okay. Like, it was like delayed healing for me. You don't have to force yourself to heal in that specific

moment. I don't believe, but it's like when when it's time, it's time and you kind of have to listen and respect that it's time to now receive and do the healing. I also did a lot of neurofeedback therapy. Neurofeedback therapy has really, it's as an adjunct to talk therapy, I think it's great. I don't think that it's one or the other. I don't think that only talk therapy could have gotten me where I am now. And again, it took a lot of the self-help and at home type of exercises for me to get to where I am mentally. But it's like, I'm still battling this. I have horrible days. I have granulomas that irritate the hell out of me constantly. When I wake up in the morning, the first thing that I feel is the pain from these granulomas. And then I go to the mirror.

And the first thing that I see is my body covered in scars. And then I look over on social media. And the first thing that I see is all these gorgeous women with perfect bodies on a beach in a bikini. And I would love to do that too. And it's just like, constant defense, constant mental defense that I have to reassure myself. And it's, it's like, it's a muscle. You grow the muscle and the muscle grows. And I also love hearing other people's stories because, you know, there are so many people who share becoming paralyzed or, I mean, so many circumstances that at the end of the day could be a lot worse than what I'm dealing with. A lot of people, too, ask me, they're like, well, well, you don't seem sick because you seem, you know, positive.

happy all the time and it's like well again it's a constant mental exercise like I have to kind of like force myself and pull this positivity out of me otherwise I'm just going to live a horrible depressed life and I don't want that for myself there was so like so many days in the hospital I was like don't save me I would rather die like I don't want to deal with this anymore so many days on independent treatment I was finding the will to live was very difficult for me those are the things that like I don't talk about super openly because I don't want to focus on that I want to focus on how can I love my body more and how can I finally like beat this once and for all sure you think uh when you talked about yourself before the situation happened when you were doing

the B12 injections pushing your body too far not listening to it had you had some of the coping strategies that you've learned so well now and some of the mental techniques the muscle that you've grown do you think you would be successful with these strategies applied back then? Like, has this made you better? Yeah, absolutely. I didn't, I wouldn't say, even though I looked so good before, like I really did. I had nothing to complain about. I had the hardest time accepting my body.

Even, and it's like totally valid. You can look great and still have insecurities. That's the majority of the reason why so many women get work done is because there really isn't a huge issue there. They just want to perfect it even more. And had I learned self-acceptance or been taught self-acceptance or even realized that I wasn't accepting myself and that I was pushing myself to kind of these unrealistic expectations, I would not have probably gotten myself into this mess. And it's a lot better to learn it beforehand than after, unfortunately. Well, that's the message you're sending out to the world now. Yeah. Learn these techniques now.

Yeah. because it'll save you a lot of work in the long run. And that, you know, young women I care a lot about too because I look back at myself as like a, you know, young 21, 22, 23 year old girl and I'm like, I just didn't know better. And I'm still young. I'm literally 26. You're still a baby. I'm still young.

But yeah, I got to learn a lot because of this situation. And it's like these techniques should be taught to girls in high school. Yeah. How does it feel, you know, you talked about experiencing this trauma over again by journaling it, by writing about it. How does it feel talking about it with me so openly to millions of people at home? I've come such a long way with talking about it. I remember whenever I was first talking about this, I mean, the whole time it was like ugly tears. I couldn't get a word out. Now I only cry like a couple of times. And it's when I really hit those like hard moments. like in the hospital. I have a lot of like footage and pictures too from the hospital. I wasn't able to look at it probably until six months ago. So looking at all that stuff, you know, for the first time and reliving it. It's crazy. It kind of seems like I'm watching a movie sometimes. Yeah. It doesn't feel real on me. I actually don't think anything has kind of

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develop that. God, honestly. I've always been smart. I loved psychology. I was a 4.0 GPA honors student in psychology. Like, I would bury, you know, myself in these psych books. So that helped a lot. I mean, understanding the psychology of everything that I was going through, like on a neurological level you know neuroplasticity the neuro pathways that we build ourselves is so important so I think already knowing that information going into what I was experiencing I knew that I could either create like these really terrible associations or I could create better associations I also have a dad who's a marine dad and he's kind of like no BS like don't feel pity for yourself like you know and so that's who i had caring for me you know the month i was out

of the hospital and beyond and so it was it was like don't make yourself a victim you know you're not a victim and so having that really helped and um i think i just always had it in me i i used to say like if this were to happen to anyone like it would happen to me because i already wanted to have impact on, you know, publicly on social media and stuff. But for the wrong reasons, I just wanted to be some hot IG girl. And there's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with that. You know, they motivate people in, in ways as well. But I think it just had to be me. I think it kind of just had to happen. I think I had no choice. It would have been such a disgrace and such a disappointment had I wasted my brain and my intelligence and my knowledge

and everything that I already had for me not to share my story. I felt like I would have been doing a disservice had I not shared. You're doing the world of service. You really are. Because I see patients who go through tough times and not to their discredit, but they're unable to share those things because they're struggling. But the fact that you're so motivated and willing to tell your story. So first of all, I'm obviously very appreciative that you're choosing.

choosing to do it here, but also the fact that you're willing to do it at all on social media to get the nine-year-old excited about what her future may look like. That's crazy. Yeah, you're giving people bright spots where at a time they don't have bright spots to look at. So that's really powerful. Yeah. It still doesn't feel real to me because I'm still struggling to, you know. Like I'm struggling with the rest of the world. Yeah. And that's the human condition, right?

Yeah. You said you were struggling in 2019 before all this. Yeah. And it's like, you know, suffering is so normal and natural. Like we're going to suffer in this life. Like it's just this physical experience is full of trials. Like nothing is ever going to just be good. It's unrealistic to think that way, unfortunately. And I think as kids or as teenagers or young adults, we want to expect and think that everything is just going to skyrocket and we're going to be so. No, I would have never imagined in a million years that this is where I would be at 26. I was on a much different track. I made a lot of money with my corporate job before this happened. I drived a nice car and I lived in really nice apartments and I was up. I was doing so good. And boom, life humbled me really quick.

I think stories like these help people. I wish we would share. I appreciate what you do so much because you give the opportunity to people to share their stories. but it's unrealistic we're all going to you're a doctor you see the most bizarre medical cases this is a physical body and it is susceptible to so much more than we think it is you have no idea when it's going to be your last day waking up and feeling like a normal healthy human being and that's also part of my message having a healthy and able body is such a privilege it's like go to the gym exercise treat your body good eat nutrition

food, care about what you're putting in your body. I'm not saying be a perfect human, but it's like as somebody who knows what it's like to be in a hospital bed and not be able to get out of it without the assistance of somebody else at 23 years old, 24 years old, and then be where I am now and have the privilege to be able to run, have the privilege to go to the gym, have the privilege to walk from my hotel here. You know, those, some people don't have that privilege. Maybe someone in five years is no longer going to have that privilege. So be thankful for what you can do today and be thankful for how you can treat your body. That's a huge part of my message. What I'm hearing you say, and maybe I'm saying

it wrong, but correct me, if I'm wrong, that there's so many factors outside of our control when it comes to our health, the few factors that are under our control, you should treasure. Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. Treat your body with respect. It deserves to be cared for. And it doesn't mean if you get sick, it's your fault. No. Because it's easy to spin that completely the other direction and say, oh, it's your fault

that this happened. That's not the case. It's try your best. Yeah. And these things are available to. Actually, you know, to talk about my scars, I have to talk about the treatments that I had on my scars. I've before I had the laser I had lasers on my scars from the botched team you mean botched like the reality TV show you're going to be on it yeah my episode airs in two weeks actually before they were purple they were dark brown they were impossible to look at it really wasn't until they started operating on my scars and they started lightning in color that I was able to like better accept and be where I am now so though that whole botched process was a

really big catalyst in me being to where I am right now in my acceptance of my body and my situation. And there's small things like I used to put like fake tattoos on my body just so I could go a couple days without looking at them. And you know, that gave me some mental and emotional relief. And just like the spray tanning and stuff, eliminating so much of the contrast. It's like there are small little tricks that we can do to kind of not ignore, but you know, take a break from focusing on these things. And then what I realized every time when I would kind of like take a break from looking at them or hyper fixating them on them and then I would come back and I would look in the mirror, then I would kind of be like, oh, yeah, it's really not as bad as I thought. And so I would

say like if there's any person out there like really struggling with whatever they're seeing or whatever they're nitpicking, it's like just try to maybe not focus on it, whatever you can. Like, you know if that means don't look in the mirror for five days like don't look at the mirror for five days still brush your teeth but you know there was a professor uh george banana who just sat in your seat maybe a couple of weeks ago and he's an expert on trauma and grief and he talked about the concept of coping messy or coping ugly where he's like humans we do this innate thing where sometimes when we're going through a really rough time for an extended period of time we just need a break as you explained and we might just get really drunk one night and it doesn't mean

develop substance abuse and start drinking every time. But sometimes you just need that break, which breaks that emotional tie you have to the situation. And when you come back, hopefully you'll be a little bit less emotional, a little bit more objective, like you said, as if a stranger was looking at the situation. And I think you explained that in a practical way very well. Yeah. The thing I wanted to touch on was I know a lot of people, like you started off this situation

by seeking help from a quote unquote natural supplement. And now some of that community has come to you and even wrote comments, if only you ate fruits and vegetables, if only you took this supplement, if only you took this miracle pill. Tell me about that. Yeah, it's just, you know, a lot of people are telling me, like, you need to do this parasite cleanse and you need to go on a water fast only and only eat fruits and vegetables and go vegan. It's like, hold on, I don't think you understand that this bacteria was injected into my subcutaneous layer. Also, I forgot to add, you know, mycobacterium, it's a multi-drug-resistant bacteria. In many cases, it's slow growing, but I also had deoxycholic acid improperly injected

into my skin layer. So not only was this bacteria growing in the subcutaneous layer where they injected me, but the deoxycholic acid was not dissolving my fat. It was dissolving my flesh. so I had a flesh wound wound with a flesh eating bacteria just spreading seating exactly so that's why my case was as severe as it was and it's like these these things aren't like everyone asked me like have you consulted with a naturopathic doctor yes when I was in the hospital I had a naturopathic doctor that it was a part of my team there was nothing that he was able to do he was able to offer me some acupuncture for the ear problems that I was having still not anything else that he could do with some of the other side effects you know in regards to my health yes you know preserving the organs certain supplements that I was able to take essential oils you know stuff like that okay it was effective in other aspects of my health but in regards to

you know the mycobacterium no it's like there is there is no frequency healing or infrared light or anything that is going to impact this bacteria because even the antibiotics are not able to penetrate the biofilm that this stubborn bacteria is able to create. And so it's like, I appreciate that people, you know, want to help and that they believe that there's, um, you know, other solutions. And I want, believe me, I'm the most desperate one here. I want to believe that these solutions will work too. But, um, they, it's just, it, it, other than bacterial phagy therapy, am I saying that right? Bacteriophage.

Bacteriophage therapy, which a lot of people mention, I think more people in Europe mention it than anybody, they keep telling me, like, ask your doctor to get on that. And it's like, bacteriophage therapy is not like this easy thing either. They have to really create this, like, perfect puzzle piece match with this bacteria. And it's a virus that goes in and kills the bacteria, right? Yeah. And it's like, that's going to take months just to figure out. Yeah.

I mean, that's not a YouTube or TikTok. commenter placed to guide that treatment. Yeah. And I'm like, first off, I would have to go to like another country, find a clinical trial, get part of the clinical trial. It's like it's just not realistic. Like right now the antibiotics is really the only treatment option that I have. Maybe I built a resistance to the antibiotics after being on them so long.

And that's why there's relapse. And that's where there's potentially mycobacterium growing these encapsulated balls, these granulomas. or maybe this is an immune response. You know, I just had an MRI the other day, and they see more thickening skin. So what they're seeing on the MRI is actually certain areas of my body are creating like this thick skin tissue, and then what happens is this thickening skin turns into this granuloma, and then the granuloma grows pretty aggressively from there.

And then it's like a ticking time bomb. Like I only have so much time to find... Before it opens. Yeah, before it opens, which. I you have to take it out before it opens and obviously removing it the smaller is better and um right now I've really been struggling with finding a um surgeon because I've been using that um surgeon who makes the rude remarks um this entire time and because my last two surgeries were unsuccessful I just would really feel comfortable being with somebody else and also the outpatient care too is super unfair I was packing 13 inches of gauze into my own stomach like why Why, why do you have somebody who's already going through all of this? Like, I'm drugged up on Oxy's one day post-surgery. It's 5 a.m.

And I'm, like, trying to, like, stuff, you know, an entire roll of gauze into my own stomach. And I'm, oh, you saw that video. I was, like, crying. I was an excruciating pain. And it was horrible. Like, why am I having to do my own wound packing now? They're like, oh, she's been doing this for so long. She's got it.

And it's like, it's not fair. Send nurses to the house. Check up on me. you know be involved in my healing it's like i think the nurses you asked me about nurses my nurse care has been amazing my doctor care has been pretty hit or miss at this point it's missing more than it's even hitting it's like i have to wait weeks for responses sometimes and i'm calling them up like where the hell is my doctor like is what i'm going through not serious like i just found another granuloma like i need a response you know why do i have to wait

18 days to go get an MRI. Why do I have to wait two weeks to talk to the next surgeon? It's ridiculous. It's like, this is so serious to me. And I've been dealing with it long enough. You would think that there would be more seriousness on the doctor's behalf for getting these appointments in on time. There are so many days where I'm just like, put me back in the hospital because I actually got better care when I was living in the hospital and people were able to do things. Now that I'm outpatient having to wait a month to have a surgery. It's very fragmented. No. And it's like an hour to this appointment, an hour to that appointment. It's not easy. And the more that everyone else delays on getting, you know, the MRI orders, the ultrasound orders, all of these things, the more I have to

suffer. And the more these things are just growing on the back end. So that's what I'm dealing with mentally like yeah I'm trying to accept the body that I'm in and you know grow this as my business because this is you know the only thing that's even paying me enough to pay my rent right now thank god it even is and then I have this relapse and whatever these granulomas whatever is happening and I have to deal with the mental toll of that and like I have so many days where I'm like oh my god what if I do become that girl who's on this treatment for five years and what if in a year I'm still getting surgeries. There's so many what-ifs that are constantly popping up in my brain, too, like, oh my God, what if I don't beat this? What if I did become resistant? What if I do have to

get on a bacteriophage trial? Or what if there's no solution? Like, what if this is something that is, you know, the bacteria can live dormant in the body for seven years? What if I have to deal with this for seven years? Then I don't, I don't know if I'm going to want to be alive. Like, I it's it's so impossible for me to imagine how ugly it could still get like just because I've gotten to this point doesn't mean you're in the clear I'm not in the clear and that's the most terrifying thing about all of this I may act positive and and give the advice that I give but like I'm fighting too yeah it's important that you show that aspect as well and you know you've gone to this multi-year journey you've had ups you've had downs you've helped people

you've also struggled yourself, as you mentioned. You initially were very curious about doing these injections. What are your takeaways, like if you had to give three takeaways or a few takeaways for the audience? What should they know about your journey that you'd like for them to know? Just don't, don't do anything if you really don't have to. Instead, like, work on those things that you can work on to accept whatever it is that you're trying to change and max that out.

as much as you can before you do anything and to like just don't be too hard on yourself don't expect too much out of yourself i think for a lot of like highly driven people or success driven people it's it's the worst advice because they're like they don't listen to it at all and i get it because i was there i was her um but like take some time for stillness and try and like be present uh you know i know there's like a lot of gym addicts and stuff out there and there's a lot of people with body dysmorphia and it's like there's tools that we can harness and please use those tools too like I'm not saying that you know you need to be extreme and and give up whatever it is that you're holding onto to like

achieve whatever you have in your head like that idea of success or you know but at the end of the day it's like just don't put unrealistic expectations on yourself to look be or feel a certain way just kind of maybe just accept what it is right now and and be patient and kind with yourself in the journey. I think, you know, loving and appreciating the journey is really important. And then, you know, the third one probably just, yeah, like I said, respect your body. And if you have, you know, the ability to walk and use your legs and your hands and your arms, it's like, be careful what you complain about. It's like this entire process, sometimes, I compare it to, you know, when the kid is throwing a fit in the grocery store and the

parents, like, I'm going to give you something to cry about. That's what I felt like the universe did to me. I see. That's, you know, all preventive advice. And I'm curious, if you go back in time to 2021, you've already gotten the injection. The situation has started. You've been diagnosed with mycobacterium. So it's the beginning of that journey. What do you tell yourself? Stellist lenses do more than just correct your child's vision. They slow down the progression of myopia. So your child can continue to discover all the world has to offer through their own eyes. Light the path to a brighter future with stellar lenses for myopia control.

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the Hulu original film Swiped, is now streaming only on Disney Plus. I know it may not seem like it, but you're going to find good purpose through this. I prayed a lot for purpose before this happened. I, you know, I was successful and I had a lot of material things. You know, I was a college graduate and I made good money and I had all these things, so I still didn't feel like I had purpose. I still felt really empty in that way. and um yeah i think i think man's search for purpose is a natural thing i think we all want to find

purpose like we will all want to believe that we were here for something more and something better i didn't want to think that this was kind of like my purpose but now i've come to accept it and yeah i i would just tell myself like going to find so much value out of the suffering. I'm not saying it's going to be worth it because it's still not worth it, but I found a lot of maturity, wisdom, humble attitude, gratitude. I've found so many great things out of this too. And that just goes to share that, like, you can go through some of the worst times. And I think everyone who has gone through a horrible situation or like a true time of suffering will tell you that that's kind of what made them

I think a lot of success stories you know you talk to tons of people who have amazing success stories and I think they all talk about those ugly really horrible parts of their life making them who they are and it's like if in that ugly horrible part of your life you can tell yourself this is making me better there's purpose in this I just have to make it to the next day and then one more day and one more day, the power of one more, you know. I think that's what's going to make you. And your suffering doesn't have to be, you know, medical necessarily. It can be mental, too. You know, there's two components of the story that can really help people. If you're mentally suffering, too, like understand, like, you have to have faith and believe that there is light at the end of the

tunnel. I have no idea where my life is going to be in one year. I have no idea if in one year I'm still going to be fighting this and that's going to suck but i can't focus on that it goes for everybody in their suffering and and journey yeah i appreciate you being so open about this and sharing with such transparency i can tell the genuineness of what you're saying obviously the emotions and all that feel very real the fact that you're highlighting so many of the positive so strongly the post-traumatic growth aspect of it of all the things you've learned and simultaneously talking about how much this sucks and how worried you are shows the duality of the situation and really the situation that so many people find themselves in their trauma nobody wishes for

trauma but if you have trauma to wish for growth that's a great thing to wish for yeah and i think that's what you're talking about when you were speaking to yourself on day one yeah there's a lot of duality here it's um yeah a lot of the times i don't have words like i can't even believe that i'm here talking with you just because of my story it's like oh my god people people care about a flesh eating disease this much but you know it's like actually though bacteria is to be feared like i cannot say that enough times like there is dangerous bacteria out there there are reputable surgeons that are infecting people, unfortunately, and, you know, they may have the best IG and they may be TikTok famous and whatever, but it does not necessarily mean that

you are safe. And I would really, you know, that's one thing I wish that there was a better way to kind of like share other people's surgery mishaps and that there was more accountability there. Like I know you're a doctor and I don't want to, you know, cross any lines, but there's a lot of lot of doctors that have surgeons more so that, you know, that surgeon that infected those 20 girls, he's not paying any consequences. He's not going to have his license removed. Nothing's going to hurt him. Of all the 365 people that I've talked to with mycobacterium, only one person has ever had a successful lawsuit. When you're getting these, you know, plastic surgeries and these operations done, you do sign away your rights and your ability to sue most of the time anyways.

so that makes things even more complicated for a successful lawsuit. And, you know, a lot of the times they'll kind of just pay these girls like 20,000 and hey, shut up. Yeah. It can be a dirty business, especially if you go abroad. I hear a lot of people as a way of cost savings go to different countries where regulation is much less. And I've seen the granulomas. I've seen a glute elapsis in the butt of just like a giant hole as a result of injections from other countries. I've treated that. I've packed it myself.

Oh, really? Yeah, it's a terrible situation to see happen, again, to someone healthy who this wouldn't have otherwise happened to. And I don't want to get to the point, I'm going to do the medical thing. I don't want to get to the point where I start telling people to be afraid of bacteria because it's very easy to go too far with that notion to be, you know, afraid of all germs and things like that. And there's ways that bacteria, even as you mentioned, where it could be beneficial

and having a healthy balance of bacteria is interesting. I think the thing that we need to plant in our brains is that bacteria and infections and side effects of things is not always benign. So just because we frequently hear, oh, bacteria is treated by this, no big deal, it's not benign. It can turn south. It can be very serious. So take it with that appropriate level of seriousness. Don't write it off, basically. But don't also fear it because then that could also create some harm.

Yeah. You get what I'm saying, though. No, totally. But no, I feel, I'm still in like, like, oh my gosh, I, because I have a port. I fear every day that this thing might get infected, you know, stuff like that is, it's like different because I'm still like, I'm still in it. But it was funny. I forgot my shower guards.

And so I'm in the hotel and I'm like, shit, I need to take a shower. What am I going to use to cover my port with? And so there was a cup and I like put the tubes in the cup and I like, I'm literally, showering like with this cup like on my chest and I'm like hey it works but yeah no it's it's one of the it's like you just got to look at it like I could even I could look at that situation and be pissed off like oh my god this sucks I can't take normal showers which I hate I love taking good normal showers like anyone out there that can take like good normal showers like you're so lucky I want that's so bad for myself um but you know I can also there's I can be funny about the stuff I can have comedic

relief. I think, you know, we see a lot of people actually, I think even like comedians who joke about their pain. And there is so much truth to that. Like if I can make a joke out of this, then and it makes me feel a little bit better. If it helps me like normalize a situation a little bit, then like, you know, what's the problem? Yeah, you're right. One of the things I used to tell young premeds was I would ask them a poll question when I'm giving a speech. Like how many patients do you think enjoy a laugh, like, or what patients do you think enjoy laughing? They all raise their hands and they say, pediatrics, kids love laughing. It's like, no, everyone loves to laugh.

And the people who are sickest, oftentimes are laughing the least. And everyone usually is walking in is very somber and serious. So when you walk in and you bring that energy where you're still caring, obviously, you're not poking fun, but you can bring that energy in it. I think it helps a lot. Yeah. Do you agree with that notion? Absolutely.

You know what else helped me? My doctor in the hospital was so handsome. that's a great anatomy effect yeah and um everyone knew and thought he was handsome and um i mean he was married and everything and of course i'm just this girl like bleeding busting open with like open flesh and stuff and he's like all right i got to check out you're this giant hole on your back and stuff and um but it kind of it was like it was cool it kind of helps like you know having stuff like that just was like you know a little girl moment and or yeah the gray's anatomy effect and um i even i even had one uh person comment on that that

tic talk that you or the youtube video reacting to my tic talk they're like oh m g girl he got to see your scars and i'm like okay that's a little weird yeah people online are funny yeah um but no stuff like that was there's also a really handsome nurse i remember i had a crush on him his name was kai he was from hawai and um i always loved when he would come in and do my wound packing. It was like, you know, at least someone's touching me.

No, not really. I bet you would have said that to yourself five years ago. You'd be like, what? Did I say that? Some guy doing my wound packing? Yeah. So what can we offer or encourage people to do moving forward?

We want them to write legislators. Yeah. We want them to avoid unnecessary supplementation. Ivy drips. Be careful who you listen to. Be careful about the fads. Don't do the IV drips. Don't do B12 injections. So many people do their own B12 injections too. Don't do it. Unless there's a medical indication and you have B12. Yeah, yeah, for sure. And then I'm just, I'm hoping that the right person hears my story and actually does something about it because I feel like I've had nothing but a lack of support from people that matter like legislators, DAs. hope that I can get these people in prison. And I hope that anyone repeating and essentially doing the same thing, like, you know, this poorly unregulated medical spas that are all over the place. I hope that

finally there's something that's holding them accountable. I hope the FDA does something. I hope that there are, you know, new committees of people that go around and, oh, there's a med spa in that corner. We're going in and we're going to, you know, get proof that they have a right to be standing and and that their practices are safe. And otherwise, it's like these people, there should be jail time. I'm saying, like, if you are so greedy and horrible of a human being that you know that what you're doing could potentially ruin someone's life and you're doing it anyways, um, ignorantly thinking that, oh, nothing is going to go wrong here.

You're wrong. And it's going to happen and it's going to ruin somebody's life. And I hope that those people are held accountable. Um, I can't wait for the day. I hope that the day exists that I see some justice. I hope the day exists that either I get a $4 million check or I see them in prison for four years, whichever one, like I'll take, like you want to avoid prison, find a way to give me $4 million.

That's how I feel about it. And I want laws to make, name it the Beatrice law, I don't care, but no one should be out there practicing without insurance and there needs to just, there needs to be a completely new way that cosmetology is handled in the United States. Can't speak on over the seas stuff. I don't think that anybody should be getting work done overseas. Well, I'm hopeful they listen. And I think with your powerful words today, I would be shocked if they didn't. Yeah. So thank you again, Bia. I appreciate your honesty and transparency again. And we look forward to seeing you for episode two in a couple of years where you're like, oh yeah, we shut them all down. We have all these laws. I testified in front of

of Congress. That would be crazy. Because that would be really cool as a follow-up. You know, in the hospital, I have visualized some of those things, too. Visualizing is really powerful. And even though I never thought that I would end up doing this, I remember being in the hospital. And whenever I had all this stuff being explained to me, like that I was essentially

not really going to receive justice, you know, several doctors and lawyers and people told me that, I remember, like, visualizing, no, there has to be a way. And so maybe this is just all a manifestation of something like that coming about. Fingers crossed. Step one. Yeah. Thank you so much for even caring about my story. What an emotional story for Lovely Bia.

I mean, she's been through a lot and her transparency and her dedication to making sure that less people will go down the same path of having these negative outcomes. That's why I frequently say, do not over supplement, do not overoptimized. and unfortunately this is the prime example of what could happen huge thank you to bea for obviously sharing all of that with us and huge thank you to you for listening if you enjoyed the podcast and conversation please do rate us five stars because it goes a long way in helping promote the podcast and allowing others to find it as well as always stay happy and healthy