“My memoir is the first book that I’ve written and it essentially follows the story of me as a young teenager in the peak of my athletic career as a cross country runner and suddenly I am stuck with mysterious symptoms that no doctor can figure out,” said author Elizabeth Nielson. “I had this excruciating pain in my lower back and it gets worse and worse and worse. It’s followed by other symptoms and becomes systemic, where I am really sick and my hair is falling out.”

The memoir covers the issues of medical issues being blamed on hormones, mental illness, menstruation cycles or even fabricating the whole thing. Eventually Neilson achieved a diagnosis and is much better.

“I had to keep advocating for myself,” Nielsen said. “I had to keep telling them that they were missing something, and that something was wrong… Finally I hit this point where I met this one doctor that tied it to various conditions that went back to Covid. Which caused extensive nerve damage.”

Though Nielson had to battle doctors and healthcare professionals who doubted her condition and waved it aside, she herself is working on obtaining a nursing degree from NMU. She balances school and her job at the hospital. All the while working on this memoir of her personal battles with medicine.

Elizabeth Neilson

“I started writing this in January,” Nielson said. “My goal actually was to write it before we we went back to school in the spring semester, I had a really tight deadline for myself. Things got away from me, I got busy at work and had an issue with my health. Then I kind of dropped the project… Then summer started and that is when I started working night shift. Suddenly I was spending 12 hours during the night and I had a lot of free time. I found it so easy to bring my laptop and begin writing, and within a few weeks I was done with the book.”

Nielsen started the memoir in January, but provides excerpts at the beginning

of every chapter that are taken from her journals and notes that highlight her thoughts at the time the events were happening.

“The intention is that though I write this now, you can also see what I wrote then, as I was living it,” said Nielson in her note to the reader, in her book The Toll it Took.

Nielsen believes that her memoir can really resonate with readers who have battled illness, currently battle with it or those who have friends who have gone through it.

“I believe this memoir would resonate with readers in our community, especially those drawn to mental health, recovery, women’s stories and emotional resilience,” Nielson said.

The book, “The Toll It Took,” can be purchased on Amazon in print or for kindle.

Antonio Anderson can be reached at 906-228-2500, ext. 550. His email address is aanderson@miningjournal.net.