How an Endocrine Disorder Grew into Greater Empathy

This is one side effect I wasn’t expecting

This is one side effect I wasn’t expecting

Photo by Polly T on Unsplash

I grew up with a black-and-white pull-yourself-up-by-the-bootstraps mentality. Hanging onto the rungs of the lower middle class, my family preached the virtues of hard work and self-sufficiency. Society sold us a story that hard work alone would bring us the ultimate prize of the Amer…