From the Outside Looking In

When you’re sick you have a tendency to talk about your current/past medical issues as if they aren’t a big deal. I’m incredibly guilty of this. I know a lot of people have a tendency to feel awkward when I joke about it or just talk about it nonchalantly but sometimes I forget that what I’m dealing with is far from normal. Today was the biggest eye opener I’ve had in a while.

After struggling with the transition of being a pediatric patient to being treated like an adult, I realized that the doctor I was working with wasn’t able to give my case the attention it deserved. I’ve been with this hospitals since I was diagnosed at age 4 so you can understand why leaving breaks my heart. I was the one who had to ultimately make the decision to look for someone else and I did. I understood that trying to explain to a new doctor my current situation, my past, and my overall needs and expectations would be a challenge in itself. What I didn’t expect is the reaction I would get.

Before jumping into a full rundown of my diagnosis and past surgeries my parents and I laid out that with a case like mine sometimes they won’t hear from me, but when they do I need a lot of attention and sometimes this attention would be after hours. In other words, when I’m sick and having issues I’m very needy. He told us that weren’t at all a problem. Then we jumped into the nitty-gritty.

I don’t think I have every seen an individual, let alone a professional in the GI field, so caught off guard with what I’ve faced in my lifetime. At one point in the long story of my medical history the only reaction he could come up with was “well damn!” I think that’s when I knew he would take my case seriously and give it the attention it deserved.

I know my medical past (and present) makes me far from normal. I joke about it and casually talk about it because it’s a coping mechanism. I hate being treated differently, but I know it’s close to impossible for people to not see me as anything but the sick kid. I also know that they don’t see me as weak or like a sick, broken puppy that they just want to fix. I know that I give off the sense that I’m a strong individual and can take care of myself but somehow there is always someone trying to fix me (and I don’t mean doctors). I will always have the fear that I come off as weak and sick. Old habits die hard I guess…