You Are Tougher Than You Think

To my biggest supporters, Thank you for everything you’ve done for me. I don’t think even this will show you how much I owe you guys. I wouldn’t have made it this far without you. I would have given up a long time ago. Thank you for you supporting me, holding my hand, and being my voice when I was too young or sick to speak up for myself. Mom- I know I get on your nerves and I seem unthankful for everything you’ve done for me. That is the furthest from the truth. I know the sacrifices you have made for me. Like that one time my cat got run over by a car and you had to stay back home to take care of him while dad and I went to Boston for a surgery. We joke about this now but I know you barely slept for those days. I’m sorry for worrying you, I promise I’ll always be okay. Thank you for being my rock and my backbone. Dad- while I could be sarcastic and thank you for the UC gene, I won’t. As twisted as it is, I’m kind of grateful you passed it on. Not for the sick part or any...

As the title suggests, here is my Thanksgiving “what I’m thankful for” post. Thanksgiving has always been very special to me. Whoever knows me knows that my grandpa was is my hero. He was the first one of the family to be diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitis so him, my dad, and I always had something significant in common. No matter how horrible it was we always knew there was someone around to understand how bad we felt. Thanksgiving was always his favorite holiday. He loved having the whole family together around one table. He never failed to make the family cry with his speech before dinner. Today I feel closer to him than I have in a while. Not only because his favorite holiday is right around the corner but because yesterday morning I woke up feeling terrible. Later I realized why, I had a minor blockage in my digestive system. This is pretty normal for me and is usually pretty tolerable. Although its tolerable, its insanely uncomfortable. It made me think of the times I would ...

If you keep up with media and celebrity drama, you would have heard this already. A rapper that I am/maybe was a big fan of (@drake) came out in a new song calling out another rapper for his mental health. In his song, he says: You were the man on the moon Now you just go through your phases Life of the angry and famous Rap like I know I'm the greatest Then give you the tropical flavors Still never been on hiatus You stay xanned and perked up So when reality set in you don't gotta face it As someone who has struggled with depression and anxiety, I take personal offense to this. This is the exact reason there is a stigma when it comes to mental illness. If you admit to having a mental illness, you are weak, broken, and crazy. This was something I struggled with for a long time, hell I still do struggle with it. I have a hard time admitting that I need help or when I’m at a low point because I still think that it makes me weak. In reality, I didn’t ask for ...

Sometimes I question why I still do this. I don’t know if anyone even reads this blog…or even cares about what I have to say. Maybe my aspiration of helping someone, one day, is a little far fetched. It took one person I have known since I was young coming up to me and asking for details about my transplant and recovery to realize what I’m doing is still relevant, not just my imagination. I don’t talk religion here because it’s not relevant to what I’m doing. So this is just to give you the background of the group of people I was surrounded by to make this so touching. I grew up around a very special community that is incredibly close to my heart. They watched me grow, they were there when I had surgeries, they’ve kept up with my progress, and have recently watched me get healthy. Once a year we all come together for the holidays. It’s kind of a reunion of sorts. It was then that I was confronted by an old teacher of mine about her husband who was going to be undergoing the s...

Today was just one of those days. It’s slow at work and rainy outside. So I decided there was no better time to write. Before that I wanted to do something I haven’t done in a while. I read through ALL of my blog posts. First thing I have to do is thank you; yes you, for reading this. I knew my stuff is deep and emotional but wow, the heartstrings I tend to pull at. It took reading back through everything to realize it’s some rough stuff to read. So thank you so much for supporting me through all of this. Now for some great news….you ready? If you haven’t heard already there has been huge steps made in the research into Crohn’s and Colitis. Finally! Let me tell you, as someone who has been dealing with this for almost my entire life this is the biggest relief I have felt in a while. It doesn’t even have to do with me and I’m insanely excited. The studies show that there might be a fungus that causes these diseases in some cases. Unfortunately for me, mine is genetic so there is st...

I would like to take a moment to thank Alessia Cara for being today’s TLC and Christina Aguilera. Thank you for being a voice for the uncertain and un-confident. Thank you for giving us another necessary pep-talk because sometimes the world and people suck. I grew up with TLC’s “ Unpretty ” and Christina Aguilera’s “ Beautiful ” to remind me that self-love is one of the hardest, yet most important parts of people’s lives. Now, joining some of the greats, we have Alessia Cara’s “ Scars to Your Beautiful ” to remind us of the same thing.  For me, the scars are literal, but that’s not how others perceive it. Its more about being comfortable in your own skin and ignoring all negative judgments today’s world pushes on us. Life hands us some sucky cards and it’s our job to make the most of it. We have the power to decide what we want in our life and how we’re going to live it. I’ve had my dark points, depression and anxiety are forever a part of me. I made a promise that for eve...

Today was hard to figure out to write about. I knew I wanted…needed to write but struggled to decide on a topic I haven’t taken on before during my medical “down time.” (I really hope that doesn’t jinx me…fingers crossed). Recently, reality hit hard. Bad things happen to great people, the world is full of unfair circumstances, and life is more precious than we realize. Come to think of it, I don’t think this post has anything to do with my medical issues. It’s just insight of what gets you through the rough times. Everyone has them, so what do you do? Turn to those around you. Being “blessed” is a new craze that has been going around lately. Being blessed with a great group of friends/family, blessed with great genetics (not me, I know), etc. I’m not big on the craze but since we’re all on the same page here let’s run with it. I got lucky, or “blessed,” with the people that have come into my life or have been here the whole time. I have the best family a sick kid could ask for and...

Social media, as much as I love to hate it, is a huge part of my life. I think everyone knows that all parts of college Greek life use social media to brand the sisterhood/brotherhood. So I’m no stranger to being an active social media user. Yesterday was a big step for me, it was the first time I was comfortable enough to share a picture with a straight shot of my scar. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve posted picture of my in a bathing suit before, but my scar is never prominent. I make sure of that. I guess after years of me trying to convince others that scars are what make them beautiful I’m starting to take my own advice. I hate my scar, but I love it more. (I know that makes absolutely no sense so let me explain). I hate it because: it’s an ugly reminder, people stare, and I barely have a bellybutton because some stupid resident wanted to test a new glue substance instead of stitches on an 18-year-old girl who obviously didn’t have enough to worry about already. The list goes on...

Today I sat back a realized it’s been a while since I’ve written anything. Thinking to myself, “well, life has been pretty good lately so I don’t have much to vent about.” That's when I realized that’s the wrong outlook to have. Just because life is going really well for me right now doesn’t mean I should forget that others are still suffering. More importantly, feeling good and being happy is something that I shouldn’t take for granted. Yes, this disease is a roller coaster; I can’t overlook the good while it’s here and just wait for the bad to come back around. When I came back from my transplant I was a senior in high school trying to figure out what college I wanted to go to since that was an option again. I started to get fed up with “pity” high school drama. Mere months before I was caught up in that same kind of drama. The boy you have a crush on is dating your best friend, or “my boyfriend of 2 months broke up with me and it’s the end of the world!” When I came back no...

While a majority of my posts pull at heartstrings, this one isn’t meant to at all. I find myself in tears writing these 95% of the time but this one I feel is more awkward than anything else. Why you may ask? Because no person, especially a self-conscious female, wants to draw attention to something they see as a flaw. So don’t take this next comment as me being cocky. It’s quite the opposite. When it comes to my last surgery, my life changing transplant, I’m kind of a miracle. I guess “kind of” is an understatement. It hit me while in Minnesota for my yearly checkup that no one expected me to have the life I do now. Long story short, I shouldn’t be insulin free. Given the surgery I had, they were able to harvest less than half of the normal amount of insulin producing cells to take from my pancreas and put into my liver. In majority of patients only half of those transplanted cells actually take and function. I should be on constant a pump therapy to maintain my diabete...

A little over a month ago I had surgery number 5. How ironic that it happened right before the 5-year anniversary of my transplant? I’d be lying if I said that irony is something that rarely happens in my life. My life sometimes seems like a sick joke (see what I did there…sick…ha). I want to do something a little different this year. Last year I wrote a reflection, but this time I want to write about something I’ve never been able to write about before. Something I’m incredibly proud of, but something that brings back horrible memories of the struggle I faced and how far I’ve come. Every doctor has their one patient that made them a better doctor. Either the patient died on their surgical table because of something they missed or a slight mistake, someone they lost in a tough battle, someone that won an impossible fight, etc. I was, and I still am, that patient. My angel of a pediatric doctor has told me that since I survived the transplant. She constantly reminds me that I m...