Praises & Prayer Requests

Kerissa Lee • September 3, 2025

"The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness."

Lamentations 3:22-23



Dear friends,


These last several months, I’ve been working hard every day, making sure my Pain With Purpose shop is ready to be officially opened.  Not only have I been creating art daily for new notecard, bookmark, and magnet designs, but I’m also using an e-commerce site that’s different than Etsy because Etsy sadly has so many fees..  It’s taken a lot of time learning the ins and outs of the new site on top of listing every single item with its description, picture, quantity, and weight—my mind is blown by how much is involved!  Definitely makes me appreciate small shops even more. ❀️


I’ve also sadly had to deal with numerous challenges from my supplier who prints the notecards.  They did an amazing job in the past, but for some reason, the quality of their printing started showing issues, so I’ve been on the phone countless times to get those resolved.


All that to say, I’m so excited to share that, Lord willing, my store will finally be opening at the end of September. 😍 I hope you’re excited like I am!


Now for the good and not-so-good medical update..


A few months ago, I shared that my doctors wanted me to try a new/safer pain medication. Well, it has really helped my leg pain (which is wonderful!), but at the same time, it’s also been causing the unfortunate side effect of insomnia. 😞 When I was taking a higher dose of this new medication, I wasn’t falling asleep until after 6-7 AM. So I decreased the med, and I now fall asleep between 3-4 AM which has still been so hard. I’m exhausted every day from only getting about 6 hrs of sleep per night—it would be ideal to obtain at least 9 hrs of sleep since my body has such a significant mitochondrial depletion.. I have an appointment with my sleep dr. at the end of September to figure out what to do, and in the meantime, I’m trying to adjust different meds or add other natural sleep aids, but it continues to be rough. 😒


In other news, I’ve shared this many times throughout the past decade, but due to having hypermobile/loose joints from Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome Type 3, I tore my left hip labrum in 2016 and had it surgically repaired that same year. I then tore my right hip labrum in 2018 and had it surgically repaired. Well, I re-tore my right hip labrum in 2021, but sadly, I never had the chance to get it repaired because of so much going on mitochondrial-wise.. I wrote in a previous post that I started experiencing left hip pain and pain behind my hip 3 months ago. I had yet another MRI arthrogram where the radiologist injects dye into the joint. I’m sad to say that the results are not good. There’s a degenerative hip labral tear from the posterior 11:00 position to the anterior 2:00 position which means it’s much bigger than my previous tears. 😭 I’m grateful for answers, but it sure has been hard to have pain in both hips! My PCP referred me to orthopedic surgery for their opinion..


I also had my right shoulder MRI completed, and due to having loose joints, the results showed some fraying of the rotator cuff, fluid in different spots, and areas of tendinosis. Thankfully, it’s not severe, but I have an appointment next month with my physical medicine specialist to talk about options.


Last month, I saw the second opinion rheumatologist to go over my autoimmune results. He wanted repeat testing but through a reference lab like Labcorp. So I had that done. We did get my results, but he’s booked out past January! So I met with his PA recently. Unfortunately, my results looked even worse in a way. I was diagnosed with an “undifferentiated autoimmune disease.” This diagnosis is when you have numerous abnormal labs and harmful antibodies in the blood, but you don’t fully fit a certain criteria for specific autoimmune diseases like lupus, polymyositis, mixed connective tissue disease, etc. But because of my abnormal labs, I will be treated as if I have the early stages of lupus. I’m being started on a popular but pretty safe lupus drug. It sometimes has a very rare side effect of retinal toxicity. So I have to get a baseline “optical coherence tomography” (OCT) eye exam through my neuro-ophthalmologist at OHSU. I don’t see her until the end of September, though.. When I do eventually start this new drug, could you please pray I will tolerate it and have no allergies or bad interactions? ❀️ Could you also pray that this treatment will help the joint pain in both shoulders and elbows—they hurt so much every day. We’re still not sure if the severe neck weakness I experienced for 7+ months was some sort of autoimmune flare, so we’re praying that this drug can prevent the neck weakness from coming back. It’s amazing and a huge answer to prayer that my neck is doing as well as it is! Feels back to normal! πŸ₯Ή


Here’s another big praise, too. My mitochondrial depletion symptoms have been pretty stable lately—I know it’s only by God’s grace and your prayers! πŸ₯² On top of that, it’s been almost 10 months (a great record!) since I was last in the hospital for a mitochondrial crash! The time before that one, I had a severe mito crash followed by sepsis, so I was in the hospital for more than 5 weeks from the end of January through the beginning of March 2024.


Despite these latest challenges with joint pain, labral tears, and rheumatology issues, I’m just so thankful to God for this long period of feeling stable mito-wise. πŸ’š


I want to be honest, though. I’ve been feeling much better lately, so it’s gotten harder to be “stuck” at home. πŸ™ I don’t have a car and can still only drive short distances. I never could have imagined that I’d be almost 33 and in this situation. When I was feeling especially trapped at home and watched everyone get to do the things they wanted to do outside of home, this was the headline I read for that day’s devotional by Paul David Tripp: “No matter how stuck you might seem, something in your life is new every morning: the mercy of the Lord.” That immediately brought tears to my eyes because it is so true. 😭 The author continues on, saying, “Each morning the people of God are blessed with mercy from the Lord that is form-fit for the trials, opportunities, pressures, obligations, griefs, and temptations of that day. God’s mercies are not sitting dusty in a warehouse. No, like fresh fruit, they are hand-delivered by the Savior every day.” I hope this passage is an encouragement if you feel “stuck,” too. ❀️


Thank you for being on this long journey with me and for continuing to pray—I’m so blessed by your love and support! To end, here are a few more card designs I’m excited to share when the shop is open! 😊


ο»Ώ

Catch 22

By Kerissa Lee • November 17, 2025
Dear friends, Thank you so much for praying for me when I had that bad reaction to the autoimmune medication last month. I’m so incredibly blessed by your love and support. ❀️ I saw rheumatology recently, and instead of trying to prevent actual autoimmune disease from starting, they want to just monitor without any medication therapy. In other words, they want to see if more symptoms like fevers or rashes will appear (besides the joint pain that I already experience).. The medicine I did try (which worsened my mitochondrial symptoms) is actually the “safest” out there, and the other treatments for autoimmune disorders are much harder on the body—the team doesn’t think I’ll tolerate those well.. It’s difficult for them to know if all the bad antibodies that have been found in my blood will cause “actual” disease, and only time will tell.. So the plan is to just monitor and follow up with them in February. I wanted to see if my body could recover from this setback without having my IV fluids switched to a higher dextrose percentage. But by the last week of October (week 3 of this mitochondrial flare), the muscle weakness and increased pain all over was sadly still persisting, so I told my doctor. He sent in a new IV fluids order with the higher dextrose, and I’ve been receiving it for about 2 weeks now. I have definitely noticed an improvement in the muscle weakness which has been a huge blessing from the Lord. It was such a gift to feel well enough to go to a friend’s wedding reception at my church last week. πŸ₯Ή My cup was filled because I haven’t been able to see so many church friends in years! Regarding the piece of plaque that traveled to a small artery in my retina, I just had the carotid duplex scan completed last Tuesday to see if there’s any narrowing in the neck arteries. I also have the heart echocardiogram scheduled for tomorrow. My biggest, ongoing struggle has been my sleep. I’ve sadly been in a “catch 22” situation for many months now. I mentioned before that I was started on a new and safer pain medication this year. A rare side effect is insomnia, and it’s simply horrible. Night after night, every single day, I’m not able to fall asleep until after 4-6 AM. 😒 Believe me, I’ve tried every type of trick…from different sleep medications that my sleep specialist has prescribed, to all sorts of sleep supplements, praying, listening to worship music or white noise, stopping caffeine intake, etc. Nothing helps. The thing is, if I didn’t take this “new” pain medication, the pain from Mitochondrial DNA Depletion Syndrome is difficult to manage and it’s like an 8-9 on the pain scale. So then I’m up through the night, in horrible pain, and not able to sleep. But when I do take this medication, the pain is manageable, and it’s much safer to be on... Yet, I can’t sleep well while on it... Catch 22. I don’t know what to do, and it’s hard not to feel alone in this struggle. I’m so thankful to God that my health in other areas has been pretty stable.. In fact, this month (November) marks ONE WHOLE YEAR since I was last admitted to the hospital! Isn’t that soo amazing? Aside from these occasional mitochondrial flares/crashes (which happened in December, May, and October), I’ve been doing incredibly well, now that the neck weakness has resolved. But, this sleep struggle persists day after day.. I would love to be able to attend my church’s morning service in person or do many other activities in the morning. 😞 But I’m super exhausted. So many times, I ask God, “How do I go on and keep doing this every single night?” One thing I’ve learned is that God’s grace is truly sufficient for each day. He is the one who supplies me with the energy and grace to keep enduring. It’s hard, and I don’t know how long this sleep trial will last.. But, as Thanksgiving draws near, I’m reminded that I do have so much to be thankful for. Some of the biggest things: being physically able to help babysit my 4-month old foster nephew, shopping at the grocery store, having hand strength to design new note cards like the ones shown here, no longer experiencing neck weakness, and much more. The verse from Zephaniah I recently hand lettered above has been so encouraging lately. God is right by my side; he is mighty to save and will keep helping me through anything that I face. ❀️ ο»Ώ

October prayer request

By Kerissa Lee • October 19, 2025
Dear friends, At the beginning of October, I started taking a new medication for the autoimmune disease. I thought I was tolerating it just fine, but after several days passed, I began experiencing nausea, loss of appetite, weakness all over, and increased pain. πŸ™ It’s like I’m experiencing another “mito crash.” I found out that this specific lupus medication affects mitochondria. That is, it causes an overproduction of reactive oxygen species (ROS). This, in turn, causes cell damage and oxidative stress. I sure wish the rheumatologists would have known about this before prescribing. But I have to remember that Mitochondrial DNA Depletion Syndrome is rare, and they’re not “mito experts.” Anyways, the last time I felt like this was back in May.. I’m so grateful to God that I haven’t needed to be hospitalized from this, but at the same time, I’m also sad that this happened at all, especially because I had such a nice stretch of stable health. I’d really appreciate your prayers, that this muscle weakness can resolve soon, and that this increased pain all over will get back to my baseline. Every time I have a “mito crash,” it feels like I’m fighting the flu which always sucks. The pain has been hard to bear. And whenever I’m in the thick of it, it’s difficult to remember that this too will eventually pass. 😒 Pray that I will endure and follow Jesus’ example like this passage from Hebrews 12:1-2– “Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross...” Thank you all so much for praying for me. ❀️

Thank you! (+ a prayer request)

By Kerissa Lee • October 4, 2025
"Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness." James 1:2-3