My Ulcerative Colitis Journey
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Reflecting on Crohn’s and Colitis Awareness Week 2020
There is fear, there is pain, there is darkness, but amidst all of these – there is hope, beauty and endurance.
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Getting Married With IBD
How to Enjoy Your Wedding Day When You Have A Chronic Illness Originally Published June 4, 2017 I’ve received a lot of requests for this post over the last year, and figured our first anniversary would be a good time to answer those questions. Here are my top 5 tips for enjoying your wedding day despite a chronic illness. Make time for yourself. Eaton Rapids Wedding Photography – Millers Dairy Farm – Phil Black Photography The morning of our wedding was absolutely gorgeous. I spent some time alone in the morning before everyone arrived at the house doing yoga, sipping on a cup of coffee and writing a letter to my…
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World IBD Day 2017
My World IBD Day/Birthday Wish Originally Published May 19, 2017 My birthday wish this year is not for a cure for IBD. This year, I’m asking for something that might be much harder to accomplish: better care for patients. My wish is that no one ever wakes up post colonoscopy to be told: “You have a disease with no cure, come back in two weeks.” Instead, I wish for an IBD army of advocates to be in every hospital, with arsenals of accurate information and resources they are ready to provide to that new patient so they are filled with hope instead of fear. Let’s avoid the Doctor Google search and…
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Reflecting on 2016
Originally Posted on December 31, 2016 What. A. Year. Globally and nationally the world has seen a lot of tragedies and set backs, and there are a lot of people who are ready to put this year behind them and move forward with hopes that 2017 has to be better. It feels almost awful to say this due to the sadness I’ve seen across the globe, and please don’t view me as someone who doesn’t see these things happen and who isn’t affected by them. My heart has been broken over and over again and I can’t count the amount of times I’ve said I’m losing faith in humanity, or…
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A Letter to My Newly Diagnosed Self
Originally Posted November 6, 2016 Dear Self: By now you are probably coming down from the anesthesia and are realizing that while you finally have a diagnosis of Ulcerative Colitis, you have no idea what that is. The doctor told you to go to the internet to do some research, and I am here to tell you that there is a lot of scary stuff out there, so be careful and cautious about what you read. Start building up a support team, right now. Make sure you have a GI you can trust, a primary care doctor who stands up for you and supports you, a yoga practice that…
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Hope in Plot Twists
Originally Published June 17, 2016 I’m married!! Our wedding was an amazing rainy day and we left and spent the following week in beautiful Northern California, ending in San Francisco before taking the red eye back home the following Sunday. I was blessed enough to be able to enjoy my wedding and reception in remission, thanks a lot to remicade and my lifestyle choices that I practice daily. I was planning on writing this blog about my tips on how to deal with IBD on your honeymoon, but the tides have turned, so I’m writing to tell you about why I can’t take remicade until further notice. I had a…
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Hope in My MRI Scan
* warning* this is a long post If you are looking for my tips on how to prepare for an MRI and don’t care about my experience scroll to the bottom. Thanks for reading! I wanted to share my MRI experience last night in hopes to prevent others from going through what I went through. I was told that this would be a 30 to 45 minute scan, with no contrast but lots of breathing and holding my breath. First off, let me say that I went into this with complete confidence. I’ve had an MRI on my back years ago and knew what it was like and was prepared…
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Hope in Paper Flowers
I’m getting married in June. At my recent doctors appointment, my PCP asked , “So, you’re working full time, planning a wedding yourself, trying to stay healthy, workout and stay in remission all at the same time? Aside from every other life task, am I missing anything?” No, Dr. Miller. You’ve got it. It’s overwhelming sometimes managing your own care and trying to have a life at the same time. I’m constantly checking in with my body and asking myself a million questions about my physical and mental state. It’s like one of those questionnaires at the doctor : Any bleeding today? How many glasses of water did you drink?…
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Hope in Letting Go
Originally Published March 1, 2015 Disclaimer: This gets a little personal for me. I’m not looking for pity, and I know that things could always be much worse. I’m not trying to get sympathy. I just want to share the reality of what life is like with a chronic illness.Depression is in my family, so I’m always very aware of my mental health state, and I knew that I was slipping down that slope and had to make a change. This is my way of dealing with how this disease has changed my life. I’m sharing it because I know there are others who struggle with it and I hope…
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Hope in Vacations
Originally Published February 22, 2015 I can’t say I’m entirely thrilled to be back home in -23 degree mornings (yes, that is a negative 23 temperature), but man, I missed the privacy of my own bathroom and only having to share it with one other person. Little blessings. Vacation was different this year. This was my first non-sick/IBD related day off from work in over a year and a half. You could say I was looking forward to it. I wasn’t even realizing that this was my first vacation with my IBD. The thought did not even cross my mind at all. I was thinking of sun, and sand and…
