Hello all, I have to something really humbling and hard. My name is Gloria, and my 3 beautiful babies are Nya (15), Jude, 12 and Piper, 10.

Life changed very quickly for our family this Fall. For most of the summer, I was working hard, loving my work. I was able to buy a house for my children that they loved Winnipeg because we were finally there. Financially secure, independent Mom who was “doing it all.”

Through the summer, things started getting hard. I couldn’t work 6 hours without my body feeling deeply exhausted. It felt like a wet blanket of tiredness that I was dragging with me everywhere. Then my feet, hand's, arms and legs started to hurt to point where walking became hard, everything became harder. I started working from home more, I went to the doctor and initially nothing alarming was found. My family doc shrugged his shoulders, asked if I was drug seeking and then promptly sent a letter announcing the closure of his practice.

My sister and my friends saw me continuing to decline and pushed me hard to scream for help

from the medical community till someone heard me. During this time, my short term memory loss became remarkably changed. I couldn’t no longer remember what I had for breakfast. I couldn’t remember what advice I had given my clients, the drive home started feeling unfamiliar, a drive I knew by heart. My words started coming out wrong, my brain always seemed to be 30 seconds of what I could communicate.

On Nov 11, 2025, I felt so sick that I couldn’t handle it anymore and I called Healthlinks, terrified of being told I was anxious or too catastrophic. The nurse, whose kindness, I will never forget, told me exactly what to do and where to go. The urgent care clinic at HSC, a nurse practitioner took me from there. A neuro exam was done which I didn’t pass and Kristina, the best nurse in the world, ordered a head CT with contrast.

I expected it to come back clean, but not that day. She came to the back to tell me that I had visible signs on the CT that showed the left artery to my brain was narrowing, that it looked like a string of pearls. Through further testing, the left artery taking care of my left kidney also showed narrowing. The migraines and neck pain that made me useless.

Then the seizures started, and the advice to take off work and to stop driving. I explained to my children what was happening. My arteries are narrowing not because I eat bad food but because of abnormal cell growth in the walls. This a rare disease called Fibromuscular Dysplasia. There is no cure.

My case is complex with a high risk of a brain anyeurysm, stroke, TIA’s and heart attacks. Tests and treatment will be ongoing for at least 6-9 months before the specialists decide the best course of action.

in the meantime, expenses and bills are piling up. Household expenses, groceries, clothing for my kiddos, fuel for the constant trips to the hospitals, parking expenses.

I was self employed for many years and I work with entrepreneurs. I was an entrepreneur. Solving problems, the hardest ones I could find, were my specialty. Right now, I can’t trust my brain to work until this is figured out and the seizures stop so that I can drive again and work again. Build something good again.

Any and all support is very humbling and greatly appreciated. This is a very strange and frightening place to be. Rising again is my specialty, and I am determined to rise up stronger in the end.