Marina D. Story 
You open your mouth to speak and what comes out sounds rough, raspy, and strained. Your voice is lower than usual, harder to project, and occasionally cracks or breaks mid-sentence. If you keep asking yourself why does my voice sound hoarse and the problem is not going away on its own, something specific is happening
That persistent sensation of fullness in your ears, like you just got off a plane or came up from underwater, except you have done neither. Sound seems muffled. Your own voice sounds strange to you. You yawn, swallow, and try to pop your ears with no success. If you keep asking yourself why do my
You open your eyes and before you have even gotten out of bed, your jaw is already aching. Maybe it is a dull throb around the joint in front of your ear. Maybe it is a tightness in the muscles along the side of your face that makes opening your mouth feel stiff and uncomfortable
You noticed that your period blood is brown instead of the bright red you are used to, and now you are wondering whether something is wrong. Maybe it happened at the beginning of your period, or at the end, or it has been happening every cycle for a while. If you keep asking why is
You reach for your coffee cup and notice your hand is trembling. You try to write something down and your handwriting looks shakier than it used to. You hold your hands out in front of you and there is a fine, persistent tremor that was not there a year ago. If you keep asking yourself
You swing your legs over the side of the bed and immediately notice that they feel like they are made of lead. Heavy, sluggish, and difficult to move in a way that has nothing to do with how tired you are overall. Maybe it takes ten or fifteen minutes of moving around before your legs
You open your eyes and before you have even sat up, the room is already spinning. Or maybe it is less dramatic than that but there is a persistent wooziness and unsteadiness that follows you from the moment you wake up and takes a frustratingly long time to clear. If you wake up feeling dizzy
You snap awake at 3am and your heart is pounding like you just sprinted up a flight of stairs. Or maybe it happens right when your alarm goes off, that jarring transition from sleep to waking accompanied by a heart that is beating far too fast and too hard. If you wake up with a
You noticed some light bleeding or pink, brown, or red discharge on a day that has nothing to do with your period. Maybe it happened once and you dismissed it. Maybe it has been happening regularly and you have been putting off figuring out what it means. If you are spotting between periods, your body
That persistent metallic, sour, or bitter taste that sits in your mouth no matter what you eat or drink. It is there when you wake up in the morning. It lingers after meals. It makes your morning coffee taste wrong and turns otherwise enjoyable food into something unpleasant. If your mouth taste bitter regularly and