EXCHANGE
To think that I'll be leading a normal, healthy existence is beyond all comprehension.
-Elizabeth, letter to her mother, 1922
While Elizabeth was on the starvation diet, she was always hungry, extremely emaciated, and had no energy. After starting insulin therapy, she was able to eat substantial meals and gained weight rapidly. She exchanged inevitable, quickly-approaching death for a long happy life.
Oh, it is simply too wonderful for words this stuff. |
After Elizabeth's first few injections, her mother returned to Washington D.C. to be with her husband. Elizabeth wrote letters to her mother to stay in contact.
|
|
I look entirely different everybody says...gaining every hour it seems to me in strength and weight...it is truly miraculous...Dr. Banting considers my progress simply miraculous, none of his other patients coming near me in diet etc., and so I consider myself especially lucky. He brings all these emminent [sic] Doctors in from all over the world who come to Toronto to see for themselves the workings of the wonderful discovery, and I wish you could see the expression on their faces as they read my charts, they are so astounded in my unheard of progress...
-Elizabeth, letter to her mother, 1922
I want if you can possibly find them, the links that were taken out of my little silver watch and my gold bracelet Mrs. Crozier gave me. My arm is fattening out so much you will be glad to hear that my watch is really becoming quite uncomfortable, so I need another link put in... |
I know you will hardly know me as your weak, thin daughter, for I look entirely different everybody says, and I can even see it myself. By now I have gained a little over ten pounds weighing 60 ½ in my skin, and when I arrived I weighed just 49 lbs. |