Episode 29: The Diagnosis Didn’t Change Me
At eighteen years old, a doctor looked at my bloodwork and told me I would never be thin because I had PCOS.
Years later, another doctor walked into a room and announced that I wasn’t pregnant—I had diabetes.
Then came Moyamoya disease, brain surgeries, infertility, grief, and a growing collection of labels that seemed to explain parts of my life but never quite captured the whole picture.
In this episode, we’re exploring the difference between what explains us and what defines us. Because labels come from many places—doctors, family stories, church experiences, difficult seasons, other people, and sometimes even ourselves.
But none of them tell the whole story.
Featured Quote From Episode
“A diagnosis can explain what is happening without defining who you are. A label can describe a chapter without becoming the title.”
Listen or Watch
About This Episode
What happens when a diagnosis becomes part of your identity?
For much of my life, I assumed labels gave me answers.
PCOS explained my health struggles.
Diabetes explained my blood sugar.
Moyamoya explained the mini-strokes and brain surgeries.
Infertility explained why becoming a mother felt so difficult.
And while each diagnosis was real, none of them were ever the whole story.
Over time, I began realizing something important:
Labels aren’t usually lies.
They’re incomplete truths.
A diagnosis can help us understand what is happening. A category can connect us with resources and community. A label can describe a real experience.
The danger comes when the label becomes larger than the person carrying it.
In this deeply personal conversation, we’ll explore medical diagnoses, inherited family stories, assumptions that were never true, labels we quietly give ourselves, and the freedom that comes from recognizing the difference between a chapter and a title.
Because every one of us carries labels.
Some are helpful.
Some are painful.
Some are completely untrue.
But none of them were ever meant to become our identity.
Key Takeaways
- Labels often contain truth, but rarely the whole truth.
- A diagnosis can explain what is happening without defining who you are.
- Information is valuable, but it is not identity.
- Diagnoses make terrible fortune tellers.
- Labels often become predictions about the future if we’re not careful.
- Sometimes the labels we carry aren’t even true.
- Some of the strongest labels are the ones we quietly give ourselves.
- God consistently sees beyond labels, circumstances, and chapters.
- More than one thing can be true at the same time.
- A chapter can explain part of your story without becoming the title.
Featured Resource
Reflective Workbook: More Than the Story They Told
If today’s conversation resonated with you, this workbook was created specifically to help you explore the labels, assumptions, diagnoses, inherited stories, and self-beliefs that may have shaped the way you see yourself.
Inside you’ll explore:
- The stories you inherited
- The labels you were given
- The labels you gave yourself
- Fact versus assumption
- Diagnoses, struggles, and identity
- Holding more than one truth at a time
- What God calls you
- The story God is still writing
Through guided reflection, journaling exercises, observation pages, and Scripture-based identity work, you’ll have the opportunity to examine the stories you’ve carried and discover the difference between what you’ve experienced and who God says you are.
→ Explore the Reflective Workbook
Continue the Conversation
Devotional 29: When God Sees More Than the Label
This companion devotional explores one of the most encouraging truths in Scripture: God consistently sees more than people see.
While labels focus on a chapter, God sees the entire story. While circumstances highlight a struggle, God sees identity, purpose, growth, and possibility.
Continue the Journey
If this episode resonated with you, you may also enjoy:
- Episode 25: Some of What You Call Personality Began as Survival
- Episode 26: The Sponge Principle: What Comes Out Under Pressure
- Episode 27: Health Became Different When It Stopped Being About My Weight
- Episode 28: Some People Share a Season. Some Share a Life
Related Resources
- Reflective Workbook: Understanding Yourself Beyond Labels
- Reflective Workbook: What Your Reactions Are Trying To Tell You
- Reflective Workbook: The Whole Story
- Companion Guide: Who Helps Carry Your Life?
Together these conversations explore identity, healing, labels, adaptation, faith, health, relationships, and the story God continues writing throughout every season.
Reflection Question
What label have you been allowing to tell more of your story than it was ever meant to tell?
Is it a diagnosis?
A struggle?
A role?
A family story?
A belief you’ve repeated for years?
And what might change if you began seeing it as a chapter rather than a title?
Final Thought
As I’ve reflected on my own life, I’ve realized that some of the labels I’ve carried were true.
Some were partially true.
Some weren’t true at all.
But every one of them had something in common.
None of them told the whole story.
Not PCOS.
Not diabetes.
Not Moyamoya.
Not infertility.
Not grief.
Not the stories other people told.
Not even the stories I sometimes told myself.
Because through every chapter, God was always doing something bigger than I could see at the time.
And maybe that’s true for you too.
Whatever label you’ve been carrying…
Whatever diagnosis you’ve received…
Whatever chapter you’re currently living…
It may explain something important.
But it does not have the authority to become the title of your story.
Only God gets to write that.