Before my body completely broke down, I was the definition of a healthy person. In my 30s, I possessed incredible physical stamina. On weekends, I enjoyed hiking and camping with social clubs, and during the week, I swam at least three times. I loved being in the water so much that during my morning sessions, I could swim laps back and forth across a 25-meter pool 40 times without a single pause.
Because I was so confident in my natural health, I never took any vitamins or dietary supplements. I truly believed that a regular diet was more than enough. I ate two or three light meals a day, focusing mainly on vegetables and consuming meat only on weekends. Thanks to regular exercise, I had healthy muscle mass. I routinely stayed active until 1 or 2 AM before going to bed. For simple pleasures, I drank two or three cups of coffee during the day, and occasionally enjoyed a glass of beer or whiskey at night. I thought this vibrant life would last forever.
1. The 8-Year Financial Drain and Emotional Suffocation
Everything changed after my husband lost his job. My stress levels began to skyrocket exponentially. Under the pretext of his “pocket money” and “networking expenses” to re-enter society, he constantly demanded financial support. For nearly eight long years, I provided him with over $3,500 (5 million KRW) every single month. Eventually, my bank account was completely drained to zero.
Despite my immense financial sacrifices, his lifestyle only grew more destructive. He refused to look for a realistic job, spent nights staying out, and routinely crawled back home at 5 AM. Trapped in a prison of severe anxiety, I began drinking whatever whiskey was left in the house just to numb the pain and survive the night.
Yet, my duties as a mother never stopped. At 6 AM, just an hour after my husband returned, I had to get out of bed to cook a warm breakfast and send my children to school. My days were filled with endless, exhausting housework and fulfilling my husband’s constant demands for legal and financial documents.
My husband’s daily routine became an endless, chaotic cycle: coming home at dawn, sleeping until late afternoon, and leaving again in the evening. He became completely irrational, unpredictable, and broke all boundaries of family life. Out of nowhere, he would explode with terrifying anger at me and our children, all while continuously demanding more money.
2. When Stress Mimics Electric Shocks: The Physical Collapse
The psychological trauma I endured reached an extreme, unbearable peak. Whenever I was subjected to my husband’s irrational verbal abuse, I experienced a terrifying neurological symptom: a sharp, agonizing pain that felt like a jolt of raw electricity traveling from the very top of my head down to my toes. My chest felt so tightly suffocated that I could barely breathe.
Soon, my body began to manifest internal chaos through sweat. Sudden, massive beads of sweat—the size of red beans—would pour down my face like a torrential rainstorm. It was impossible to wear any makeup. I sweated so excessively, looking as if I had just been drenched in heavy rain, that I completely lost the confidence to meet anyone. This abnormal, heavy sweating never stopped; it haunted me all the way until my cancer recovery period.
Furthermore, the extreme stress completely disrupted my hormones. My menstrual cycle began to rapidly decline in my early 40s and stopped completely by my mid-40s—an incredibly premature menopause triggered by survival anxiety.
3. Muscle Loss, Severe Malnutrition, and the Road to Necrosis
As my nervous system shattered, my digestive system shut down completely. I lost all appetite. I felt absolutely no desire to eat, and strangely, even if I starved all day, I never felt hungry. When I visited a local clinic because of chronic indigestion, the doctor could only prescribe appetite stimulants.
My weight plummeted drastically, and my hard-earned muscles began to waste away. As the fat and muscle completely disappeared from my buttocks, sitting on any chair without a thick cushion became excruciatingly painful because my pelvic bones pressed directly against the hard surface.
It was during this period of severe physical depletion and nutritional starvation that the dark red bruises on my legs began to harden. The trapped, stagnant blood turned into permanent, deep purple lesions. After staying stagnant for two to three years, these spots finally progressed into severe skin necrosis. My body had completely lost its ability to heal itself, opening the door for both a rare vascular disease and stage 3 colon cancer.