Local Woman Shares Voice for Lupus Awareness

A Corona del Mar woman is speaking out about lupus in hopes that others will do the same.

Bridget Hood, 42, participated in filming “Voices,” a short video for the Lupus Out Loud movement by Lupus Connect, sponsored by the Human Genome Sciences and GlaxoSmithKline.

The group started the campaign and made the video in honor of Lupus Awareness Month in May. The movement encourages lupus patients across America to raise their voices and “put lupus front and center,” according to their website, www.lupusconnect.com/lupus-out-loud, and that “the collective voice is more powerful than one.”

“My hope is they [other lupus patients] realize that they are not alone in this,” Hood said.

Through LOL, “thousands of people across America [are] speaking out about the true impact of living with lupus,” the website states.

The campaign urges others to reach out to their friends and family, as well as their doctors, and talk openly and honestly about their symptoms and to speak frankly about the true impact of lupus on their daily lives.

The movement is also in response to a recent Roper survey that found that more than half of patients with lupus reported that they minimized their symptoms when speaking with their doctor, according to LOL.

“I always did talk openly and honestly with my doctor… But I felt like a broken record,” always mentioning feeling fatigued or sick, she said. “So at times I didn’t mention it (at all) because I thought it was a given. So I minimized (those symptoms).”

It’s important to discuss all symptoms, no matter how insignificant they may seem, she said, or if they‘ve been said a million times before. She also suggests keeping a journal and sharing it with the doctor.

Hood also urges patients to trust their guts about their doctors and the medical care they are receiving. It’s important to find the right doctor and/or specialist that understands the disease and that the patient feels comfortable with.

“Be your own advocate,” said Hood, who is grateful that her parents took matters into their own hands when they realized she needed better medical care. Changing doctors helped save her life, she said.

“I wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t changed doctors,” she said

The Riverside native was diagnosed with lupus as a junior in high school in 1987. She had gone to the tanning booth to prep for a family vacation to Hawaii. She immediately developed a butterfly rash on her face and had flu-like symptoms.

“I just didn’t feel like myself,” she said, but, “I ignored all my symptoms… I tried to enjoy the vacation in the Hawaiian sun.”

Within a few days after returning home her symptoms were worse and she went to see a doctor. Within a month she was diagnosed with Systemic Lupus Nephritis.

“It came on right away and started attacking my kidneys,” Hood said.

By the time she started college, Hood felt horrible every single day, she said. On the last day of her freshman year she was rushed to the ER with a dangerous tissue infection. During her month-long stay in the hospital, she decided she wasn’t going to be a victim and she was going to fight to stay alive and live a healthy, normal life.  She slowly but surely began to get better.

By 1997, she had graduated and was feeling pretty good, she said. Between 1999 and 2005, she led a relatively normal life. She began working hard on her career, ignoring her pain and fatigue.

In 2005 her kidneys started to fail.

“I took a turn for the worse,” she said.

Both parents and  all her siblings offered to donate a kidney, but ultimately it was her younger (and only) brother, Nick, a 1998 Corona del Mar High School graduate, who saved her life. In 2006, he gave her one of his kidneys.

“My whole world changed,” Hood said. “I didn’t realize how sick I was until after the surgery… I forgot what it was like to have a good, (high) quality life.”

She is now feeling and looking better than ever, she said, and works to be a role model for others.

Hood also runs a local support group that meets at 7 p.m. on the first Monday of every month at University United Methodist Church in Irvine.

“I am so fortunate to be alive,“ Hood said. “I don’t want to see other people struggle with lupus… I want them to know they’re not alone.”

For more information, visit www.lupusconnect.com.