Here’s the thing to remember when you have been sick or sad or otherwise sporting the cosmic “kick me, hard” sign on your back for a long, long time: this is not who you are. You are not this collection of aches and pains that consume your body now. You are not this bundle of [...]
Crohn’s disease
An acting teacher of mine used to get very frustrated with our class from time to time. Since he’d studied under legendary sonofabitch Lee Strasberg, he was very comfortable expressing this frustration, especially in the form of yelling and screaming. One day, having hit his limit with some slacker inanity or another, actors showing up [...]
After a half-hour fight with my gastroenterologist last night, he finally agreed to put me on short-term meds to try and control the too-earthly delights I’m currently housing in my 5’2″, 106 lb. (and rapidly shrinking) frame. While we argue a lot, a function of our positions on opposite ends of the Western Medicine Cures [...]
Thanks to my family, I have an interesting relationship with medicine, both the kind with a small and a capital “m”. In one corner, we have my (dead, workaholic) father, whose response to any and all corporal malfunction was to (a) ignore it and soldier on or (b) have something prescribed or excised and then [...]
Via a sad letter* in Cary Tennis’s “Since You Asked” advice column on Salon.com, I discovered that March is National Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month. As the recipient of no less than four six search missions up my asshole, I feel that perhaps I have some valuable information to offer those on the fence about whether [...]
As I was grocery shopping for what seemed like the 14th time this week, it occurred to me that I haven’t ever gone into much detail on what day-to-day life on the Specific Carbohydrate Diet is like for Crohnies (and UC patients), most likely because way back when I started this here blog, I was [...]
This was supposed to be a post about a surprisingly fun and interesting college alumni event that I attended last Thursday. It was also supposed to be posted last Friday, maybe Saturday, at the latest. Because it really was a fun and interesting event, complete withon a cool seminar delivered by a lively speaker in [...]
I had a smallish chunk of communicatrix carved out of my shoulder yesterday. It’s not a particularly alarming event; given I get more sun walking from my front door to the car than most of my ancestors got in a lifetime, these occasional hinky patches of skin are to be expected. What is alarming, and [...]
Have you ever been sick? Really, really sick, the kind where you and God enter into heavy negotiations? Do you remember how for the first few days you feel well after being sick, you appreciate your health for what seems like the first time, ever? That’s what happened to me after my acute onset of [...]
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Down came the hammer
You can’t be cavalier about it, that’s the lesson chronic illness teaches you about health. Again. And again. And again. I spent the first 41 years of my life powering through crisis; throw enough coffee/nicotine/man-hours at it, and there’s no problem you can’t solve. I’ve spent the last three unlearning those bad habits. It was [...]
