Part 7: A J-Pouch For JP

March 3, 2016..a day that will always have a special place in my heart. It never crossed my mind until now, but it’s quite fitting that March 3 is only about a week from my half-birthday because it’s sure going to be treated like one from now on. In the deepest depths of my hardships during the fall of 2014, it was tough to imagine regaining the lifestyle I so much cherished during high school and that freshman year at Penn State. But thanks to my soccer-loving, Argentine surgeon and the amazing team of doctors and nurses at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, I’ve been granted the second lease on life I so dearly wanted.

As I laid in my transport bed in the holding room, I knew the process too well. A short ride downstairs to the anesthesia-prep room and from there a minute or so journey into the operating room. I’m pretty sure I was still cracking jokes as I slipped off into darkness in the operating room, but that’s just how I learned to handle these situations.  By no means am I saying I need the thrill of a fourth surgery, I was just so excited for what lay on the other side…Life 2.0.

Under the comfort of pain meds, I went to bed very easily the night of the 3rd. I was able to make a more accurate pain assessment the morning of the 4th. I was thrilled about there being fewer incisions because those are what cause the most pain. There was another pain, though, that I had not experienced in the prior two surgeries; the bloating from food travelling all the way through my GI tract. My stomach was inflated like a balloon except imagine the balloon surface being as hard as a brick wall. That made the next few days quite uncomfortable. I was back eating on Friday, the day after surgery, but it was a very slow process with only a few bites at a time. Looking back on your childhood, you think that’s the only time you need potty-trained, but leave it to me to defy those odds haha. The magical moment came early Saturday. Yes, a trip to the bathroom and magical in the same sentence. Months and months of struggle and battle after battle of surgery recovery led to this uncontainable excitement.

It was a short hospital stay as I was discharged Saturday afternoon. There was no looking back as I walked out the exit…being a patient is something I want to take a looooooong break from. The battle continued at home as I was still going to the bathroom 20 or so times a day, but this was totally expected. The body needs time to regain control of muscles that hadn’t been used for 15+ months. By the middle of the following week, I was getting back to normal meal portions as my appetite grew. The sunshine and 70+ degree weather that week surely motivated me to get up and walk, something the doctors stressed I do. With each passing day, mobility came more naturally, eating wasn’t as much of a struggle, and bathroom trips became less frequent.

I think what I’m most blown away about is how I can run around and play sports again without the need to immediately use the bathroom. Before, all those movements and subsequent vibrations ravaged my stomach making physical activity almost impossible. It’s truly what I’m most grateful for because I cringe at the thought of no sports in my life. I did not have the luxury of taking showers every day with the ostomy and my skin rash because of the limit I had on my supplies. Having the freedom to workout and get back in shape whenever I want now is unbelievable. It’s more than likely something along the lines of a half-marathon, Tough Mudder/Spartan Race, or mountain hike lie in my near future. I have managed to accomplish some physical challenges since my diagnosis, but the time I was sick or recovering from surgery over the past four years is time I’m not getting back.

Not having to worry about where the nearest bathroom is anymore is an indescribable feeling. I still need to be smart with the foods I eat. Right now, I’m in a trial and error phase to see how my body reacts to certain foods. All of this will, no doubt, mean I need to eat a healthier diet for the rest of my life, but I see that as a blessing in disguise. I, also, try to avoid eating close to bedtime as I’m still striving for that first full night of sleep in years.

I’m still only 3 weeks out of surgery so my body is still adapting, but the recovery, up to this point, is far exceeding my expectations and I’m just glad to have this life back. As I’m moving back into a life with more answers than questions again, I can’t help but be so grateful for the medical care and personal support I’ve received over the past year and a half.

Now that the wounds and rash are mostly healed…

 

Part 6: Bye, Bye Bag

With just days left until another life-changing surgery, I can’t help but look back on the past 15+ months. All the things I accomplished academically and physically with the distraction of an ostomy…wow. If I made a list of everything and showed it to my former-self post-surgery in November of 2014, there’s no way I would have believed I’d accomplish even half the things.

It’s honestly been awesome stretch of my life; a piece of my life where I’ve learned so much about myself.

Before moving on though, I’d like to point out how a hospital is never a place you want to find yourself. Unfortunately, since August 2014, my hospital stays have added up to over a month. All that time has helped paint a totally different picture of life for me though…not only because of the major surgeries I’ve gone through, but because hospitals are places with one goal: the preservation of life.

100 percent, the treatment I’ve received thus far has given me my life back and for that, I will ALWAYS be grateful.

I have zero hatred for the hardships that have been thrown at my health the past few years. Has it altered my life in ways I never thought possible…yes, no doubt. But, I wouldn’t have it any other way. As my friends will tell you, I have a very tough time sitting still and am always on the search for something new to do. In line with my competitive nature, I will always welcome my next challenge. This disease might have given me more than I bargained for, at times, but I’ve relished the daily challenges because I know I can come out on top.

Dealing with a disease like this while being surrounded by tens of thousands of kids my own age at Penn State forced me to adapt and go on with life being the college student I was. This whole experience has matured me way beyond my years, but a lot of that credit goes to my friends and family who were so accepting of my hardships and allowed me to continue being the JP they always knew. As was the case with the first two, I hope to come out on top of another surgery to make it a trifecta of successes.

I love to eat and the fact my metabolism is still quite high has surely been a blessing in disguise. Just days away from closing another dietary chapter in my life, there is certainly one thing about the ostomy I will miss. Let me explain…

It’s normal to have a beverage with your meals for a reason: food can make you thirsty. For me though, that love for eating is a double-edged sword. Without a colon, the main organ to observe vital fluids, drinking water or any beverage basically acts as a river to carry food through me much quicker. It’s very tough to hold off from quenching my thirst during meals. As I can’t predict how my bowels will react to eating meals after my final surgery, I am surely going to miss the safety net of having my ostomy bag in cases where I find myself not near a bathroom after eating. It will surely be a trial and error process with certain foods, so I envision the first month or so being pretty difficult, but I’m no stranger  to being forced to change my lifestyle. The hard part is over. It’s time to remember all the bright spots these surgeries have given me and move forward with the same driven, motivated attitude.

There are very few days from my life so far where I can remember being as excited as I am for this Thursday, that’s for sure. My smile will be large going into surgery…because that’s the only way I think you can approach something like this.

Part 5: Another Surgery, Another Step Closer

As of late July 2015, I have been working at home in Pittsburgh. I was lucky enough to have returned home in time for my local Crohn’s and Colitis chapter’s Take Steps event, which is an awareness walk for those with Irritable Bowel Diseases (IBD’s) where money raised goes toward research. Early in my senior year, I met someone in my college, Zane Geist, who was dealing with Crohn’s disease. It was awesome to know someone battling just like I was and have someone to talk to who would understand the sometimes more unpleasant parts of a conversation about IBD. We put together a fundraising effort for our Take Steps “team” and ended up raising over $300 from members of our college as well as family members.

Hopefully having made it past the worst of this disease, I want to continue being involved with my local chapter and spread awareness about IBD’s. That is the reason I am writing this. I have never really been shy about sharing my experiences, but now I am more ready than ever to voice those experiences in hopes that it reaches someone dealing with the hardships of an IBD so they can see that a little perseverance can go a long way!

When my symptoms went into relapse at the start of my senior year of college, I got down on myself because I didn’t understand how this could be happening to me during what I considered the most important time of my life, a time when I needed to figure out my future with either a job or grad school. Seeing where I am in my life now though, I’ll say in a heartbeat that I was quite stubborn because every day should be treated as importantly as the day before. I honestly consider these surgeries as miracles in my life and am out to take nothing in life for granted. Every day I wake up without pain or hardship, I consider a blessing.

For the first few years, it was quite frustrating when doctors couldn’t give me concrete answers about my symptoms, but you can’t go feeling sorry for yourself. You just have to pick yourself up and try to move forward as best as you can with whatever energy you have that day. Believe me, I’ve been through the lowest of lows, but keeping a positive mindset through it all can open doors that lead to the highest of highs, which I certainly experienced.

It has been a humbling experience so far and I say “so far” because it’s an adventure where I will continue to compile experiences for the rest of my life.

Now to the main point of this post, I completed another successful surgery on December 14, 2015. This surgery was to create a J-pouch, a reservoir formed by folding loops of the small intestine back on themselves (to look like a “J”) and stapling them together where the diameter is now twice the size of the regular intestine itself. The internal walls are then removed to make the actually pouch/reservoir.

My height provided a slight road block as I had just enough intestinal length to make the connection with my anus. Otherwise, in mind-blowing fashion, the surgery was a success. This is just a temporary stage to allow time for the new connections to properly heal before stool flows through them, so I still have an ostomy. The part used for the ostomy is not the end of my small intestine anymore as that’s a part of the J-pouch now. Farther up my small intestine is being used, which means the nutrients and fluids I intake exit my body even quicker than before, so dehydration is a very real problem I face all the time. I am constantly drinking water and Gatorade, even in the middle of the night when I wake up to empty my ostomy. Pedialyte has been a regular component of my diet to make sure I’m always replenishing my electrolytes.

Recovery was about the same for this surgery. One week in the hospital and one at home before I went back to work. Luckily, it was right around the holidays so my first full work week wasn’t until 3 weeks after surgery. I was back playing soccer a month after surgery, which is a testament to my youth, I presume. As much as it sucks I was affected with this disease so early in my life, a positive light that can be shed on the whole situation is that is has surely benefitted me in terms of my speedy recoveries.

My final surgery is scheduled for March 3, 2016, a day I am already counting down the days to, so I plan on making another post around that time.

Part 4: The Surgery that Changed My Life Forever

On November 6, I woke up in probably the most pain I had ever been in. It was almost fitting that my body reduced me to my weakest state just in time for the doctor to see. He, indeed, definitely saw how sick I was when I walked into his office and after a few taps on my stomach, which I couldn’t even bear, he knew it was so severe that surgery was almost a necessity (Crazy, but true…during those prior few months, things like bumpy car rides and loud, heavy bass, music at parties increased my stomach pains from the vibrations of those movements/sounds, which made life quite boring and very restrictive for those few months). The prospect of surgery was no doubt a shock to hear, but I also handled it with a sense of calmness because I realized that nothing else was working and this was my last hope.

My GI doctor wasted no time and immediately admitted me to the hospital directly after our appointment. He scheduled one final colonoscopy for me (I think my lifetime total ended up at 6 colonoscopy’s…lol) the following morning, which confirmed the severity of my colitis and absolute certainty of surgery being required. He explained to me that I was really close to gastrointestinal perforation and that waiting any longer to have surgery could become extremely dangerous for my health. This news hit my parents pretty hard, but they saw I was still cracking jokes and acting like my normal, goofy self amidst such life-changing news that I think it put them more at ease. I mean it was GOOD “life-changing” news! Also, only having about 72 hours between finding out about surgery and the surgery itself was definitely a positive thing for my mental state.

I remember two nights before surgery, after my parents left for the night, I walked myself up to the cafeteria and got all the fried food I could carry back to my room. It had been days since I had eaten anything substantial and I was craving the good stuff. Although I paid for it the next day in the form of pain, my parents got a good laugh out of it.

Finally, on the morning of November 10, 2014, I had an ileostomy operation to remove my entire colon. My surgeon did an amazing job, it was a total success in my eyes and his. I’ll forever be grateful that I was under the care of one of the best groups of colorectal surgeons in the country.

I no longer had any pain from what I ate and felt better than I had in the last 2 years!!! It was incredible, almost unbelievable to fathom such a transformation. Now there was an incredible amount of pain from the incisions made all across my abdomen. Let me tell you, you have a lot of nerves down there.  You get an idea real quick of the daily activities that require the use of your abdominals because things like getting in and out of bed, walking, ect. were really difficult. It took me about a month to fully recover, but I was at least walking without pain after about 3 weeks.

I received so many cards from friends and family when I returned home from the hospital. Not one was thrown away; they are all still in my room at home. It really lifted my spirits and motivation to recover and return to school. The biggest surprise and biggest motivation came from a card I received postmarked from State College, PA. I couldn’t believe it when I opened it to see what was probably over 50 messages from friends and classmates in our college’s student council. There were even messages from kids outside my major that I had never talked to before. It was truly a special moment reading that card.

Adjusting to life with an ostomy and tending to it daily was the hard part. I mean the sight of my small intestine outside my skin surface was mind-blowing and still is. So mind-blowing that I passed out the first time I had to change the skin appliances. Luckily, I had a home-care nurse standing right next to me.

After missing about the whole month of November, I returned to school with one goal: do whatever it takes to graduate on time with all my classmates. We had grinded through 4 hard years of classes and there was nothing I wanted more than to walk with them at graduation. The first step toward reaching this goal was catching up with my fall semester classes. I was, indeed, able to make up the missed assignments and exams to finish the semester on time, with the exception of a final project in one class I turned in after winter break. I was still adjusting to the ostomy come Spring (2015) semester, but slowly becoming my old self again. I was getting back to playing sports and exercising and most importantly, didn’t have to worry about where the closest bathroom was at all times.

Another huge goal was being physically able to participate in THON weekend, which is a 46 hour dance marathon in Penn State’s basketball arena that is the culmination of a yearlong fundraising effort for children with pediatric cancer. Having gone through such a terrible stretch of life due to my colitis, I not only could relate to the physical and mental pain these children were going through, but I had such a motivation to immediately get back involved in my college’s THON effort because I knew, first hand, what all the outside support did for me in terms of keeping such a positive outlook through my whole battle.

And come the afternoon of Friday, February 20th, 2015, I fulfilled that goal as I ended up dancing in the stands for about 25 hours that weekend. 7 dancers represented our College of Earth and Mineral Sciences that weekend as they stood and danced for those 46 hours straight. Just as they supported me during my fight, I was there in the stands supporting and cheering them on as they were symbols for a cause much greater than themselves. It was by far the most emotional of the four THON weekend’s I was apart of as an undergrad, but I think that was a true representation of how I now truly realized the preciousness of life. Every day is a gift and I try to respect that fact in everything I do.

Before my surgery, my closest friends and I had already planned a spring break trip to Grand Cayman. A spring break trip to the Caribbean better involve a lot of swimming. I was worried about how I would be able to do that, but with the help of the StealthBelt (http://stealthbelt.com/), I didn’t have to worry. Instead, I was able to enjoy the pristine Caribbean waters just as much as my friends did…along with eating some Doritos.

The rest of the semester finished out great. My friends and I were able to do most of the things we loved doing together one last time. Come early May 2015, with graduation only a few days away, I had just secured a job upon graduation in Boston and couldn’t have been happier. So happy I made sure my ostomy got some of the limelight as I got a few graduation pictures with it wearing my tassel. We had done it! A few nights later, in what I’d argue as one of the proudest moments of my life so far, I walked to accept my diploma with many of my closest friends and classmates. It was truly an amazing achievement, something I didn’t totally believe was 100% possible when I left for home on that November 4, 2014 afternoon.

Since the humid days of last summer, I’ve dealt with skin rash issues around my ostomy that makes being

Acadia National Park

as active as I normally am more of a challenge. I can only receive a certain number of supplies through my health insurance every month and can’t afford to change appliances every single day. But, nonetheless, I’ve gotten back into exercising as well as playing soccer competitively again. Wearing a belt with dress pants really is the worst part about the skin rash being present. I’ve been working since last May so it’s been a real struggle getting it to heal, which it totally hasn’t, and its been uncomfortable at times with the bag right at my waist.

 

I surely haven’t let the rash or the ostomy bag, itself, stop me from enjoying life and challenging myself physically. In July, I hiked up Cadillac Mountain in Acadia National Park on a very fitting cool, misty, summer Maine day. The ostomy bag and I took our talents to the Rocky Mountains in October where we hiked up a member of the 14er club, Mt. Bierstadt, west of Denver, CO.

Even halfway up the climb, the views were spectacular

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finally, A BIG THANKS to the 4 other amigos I lived with during that roller-coaster senior year who helped me with so many things and put up with all my whining even if you were just pretending to listen to me haha

303 For Life, homies

Part 3: The Real Battle Begins

We’ll start this one out positive because it’s all down hill from here. I was lucky enough to secure a summer internship in March, which lowered my stress level for those last two months of school before summer. Also, the culmination of two years of hard work securing university approval for the Penn State Storm Chase Club that spawned from a spontaneous fall 2012 storm chase that us 9 friends went on was about to pay off. We got university funding to take 3 cars and 12 students on a week long storm chase trip out to the Plains. This trip, unlike the one a year prior, was a lot harder for me. The long stretches of driving really strained my pain meter. There were luckily no accidents, but a fair share of unexpected stops to accommodate yours truly. Aside from all the health-related obstacles, it was a rewarding trip knowing us leaders, still just students, led a successful week-long trip for ourselves and the underclassmen who were also on the trip.

I returned back to State College in late May to begin my internship. I had a solid group of friends who were also staying the summer and was excited to spend those couple months at school without the hustle and bustle of 40,000 other students. However, I knew my health was far from where it used to be. Regardless, I had to push forward and deal with the manageable symptoms so I could perform to the best of my abilities at work. But that was the thing, I couldn’t deal with them. I went through training sessions for the first couple weeks that lasted a few hours at a time. This was basically a death sentence or at least that’s how I thought of it. I wanted to make a good first impression, but excusing myself multiple times as someone is trying to teach you things makes for very awkward situations.  This went on for about a week before I was like “I need to tell them what’s wrong so I can lift this weight off my back”.  That aspect was relieving mentally, but it sure didn’t make the symptoms go away which were still on my mind 24/7.

The summer continued on with constant trips to the bathroom at work. I wasn’t even eating as much and was trying to eat healthier by cutting dairy products and greasy foods. I was so desperate for a solution, I even went gluten-free for a couple weeks. God bless the people who are forced to that kind of diet permanently.

The summer was filled with a growing number of literally unavoidable accidents. I no longer had control of my body. The ulcerative colitis was strengthening its grip.

There were still a few bright spots, one of which was hiking Mt. Nittany with the 3 other awesome interns I worked with

I lived less than a 5 minute drive from work and my only traffic was 2 stop lights. Yet, there were more than a few occasions where I couldn’t even make it that short trip without having an accident. It was especially bad if it happened in the morning as I’d have to turn around and come home. This would make me late for work, yet another negative impression on my employer.

It literally came to the point where I was afraid to venture too far from a bathroom at this point. Bus rides, walks across campus, short car rides, meetings, ect. You name it, it posed a huge challenge for me. That doesn’t even include the challenges I faced trying to stay fit and play sports. I mean it was the summer for goodness sake, I wanted to be outside. I had played sports since I was young enough to remember and having that leisure ripped right out of my life was really difficult. I tried to persevere through the hardships, but on a July 2014 afternoon, I had had enough. I went out for what I planned to be an easy 2 mile run. About 5 minutes in, obviously near no bathroom, it happened.  It was a long and demoralizing walk back to my apartment. That was about the time I conceded that this cruel disease was taking my life away.

I was mentally exhausted trying to keep my sanity in check with all the daily hardships…it just didn’t seem fair to me.  Luckily, one of my roommates, Adam Fink, from the prior school year, was also there for the summer. Just hanging with him after work allowed me to take my mind off things for a few hours and that was huge. As the summer winded down, I literally had just about enough energy to make it through my work day. My time away from work involved a lot of time sitting on the couch, laying in bed, or just sleeping. I was running on fumes. In late July, I developed a horrible fever one day after work and went straight to sleep. I had the chills all night, was having hallucinations, and woke up multiple times. It was like a terrible nightmare I couldn’t wake up from. I called off work the next day to try and sleep it off, but things were no better that evening either. The next morning I knew something was really wrong, so I called my parents and they drove to get me. They took me straight to our local hospital in Pittsburgh where the IV’s couldn’t have got in me soon enough. My body was rejecting all food and liquids and I was severely dehydrated and sick.

Another colonoscopy and multiple stool samples determined I had Clostridium difficile colitis, more commonly know as c-diff, which is an infection from a spore-forming bacteria that compounds inflammatory bowel disease symptoms. This meant I would be put insolation until the medications killed the bacteria. Great…another issue to deal with. Not only was I on an awful, all-liquids diet for 5 days, I was taking potent steroids and antibiotics to kill this bacteria. Thanks to all the medication, I developed thrush, a yeast infection in your mouth and on your tongue, which was literally awful. All I wanted to do when I was released after a week in the hospital was eat normal food, but because of the thrush, I totally lost my sense of taste and couldn’t enjoy any of the foods I was eating. But hey, I was in the comfort of my own home and recovering. That’s all I could have asked for at the time.

Prior to checking in at the hospital, I weighed only 134 lbs! For a kid who’s 6’0″ and

Left: September 2014 – just having returned back to school for senior year. Right: May 2015 – prior to graduation. Not hard to tell how much underweight I was just by looking at my face

normally weighs 165 lbs, it shows the toll that second half of summer really took on my body. Upon returning to school for what I hoped could be a rewarding and successful senior year, my friends, classmates, and professors couldn’t help but notice how different I looked physically. Having only weighed 134 lbs a few weeks prior, I was still trying to put weight back on. To be honest, the next few months at school were just damage control for what ended up being the inevitable.

My symptoms returned quickly and were there to stay. I think it had a lot to do with the increased stress level again and that typical college diet, which isn’t always super healthy when you are constantly busy. It was not a fun fall for me. Most days consisted of only leaving the apartment to go to classes and meetings. I only made it to 2 of the 7 Penn State home football games, which was one of the things that hit me hardest. There’s nothing like College Football Saturday’s in Happy Valley and to know I was only about a mile away from all the fun as I watched on TV was tough.

I was on prednisone from August to October, which was a lot longer than my doctors wanted me on it. Prednisone is a steroid that is used to decrease inflammation in the body which I needed for my colon. Prednisone also weakens your immune system, which made it a double-edged sword for me.

Having immediately connected with the GI doctors in the State College area when I returned to school in August 2014, I had periodic visits with them to monitor my

Left: November 2014. Right: November 2015. It’s really eye-opening to show what a few months on prednisone and a few doses of Remicade can do your appearance

symptoms, which were not improving on the prednisone. So I was put on Remicade, a powerful medication used for inflammatory bowel diseases that infuses antibodies throughout your blood stream. It was administered through an IV, but required I go to Mt. Nittany Medical Center once a month for the 3 hour infusion.

 

The constant awakening to stomach cramps at night really affected the amount of energy I had to complete my normal daily tasks. There were days where I was just too sick to even get myself out of bed to make it to class, which normally only required a 5 minute walk from where I was living. Going to the bathroom 20-30 times of day and losing so much blood and so many nutrients, I was constantly dehydrated while feeling achy and sore. It got so bad once, I had to have a friend drive me to the emergency room so I could receive IV’s.

With classes in full swing in late October, the daily grind became so difficult to deal with, I was put in the intensive care unit of Mt. Nittany Medical for a day before being brought to a general room, which I was in for another week. The series of events were something I was all too familiar with…a colonoscopy that said I had severe colitis, an all-liquids diet for a few days, and doctors who didn’t have any concrete answers for me.  I even missed the Penn State – Ohio State double OT thriller as I could only gaze out my hospital room window at the beautiful scene outside Beaver Stadium.

The visits I got that week from some of my closest friends really meant a lot, though. As I was discharged from the hospital, I was still frustrated because I knew 100% that I was not healed; I knew the battle was not over. I’d compare the August and October hospital stays to using a defibrillator on someone who has just had a heart attack. The colonoscopy’s and all-liquid diets where like restarting my body, but not healing it. Maybe the doctors truly didn’t understand how the wide array of medications I was on weren’t working, but it was certainly frustrating watching my life and senior year of college deteriorate right in front of me.

So, on the morning of November 4th, 2014, I decided I could fight no longer. Knowing I had a doctor’s appointment scheduled at UPMC in Pittsburgh two days later, my mom came to get me that afternoon and I returned home, honestly not knowing when I’d return to Penn State.

 

 

Part 2: The Calm Before The Storm

I may have went to school for meteorology, but no pun intended with the title…alright maybe a little haha. Anyways, the “calm” was just life continuing on as usual. That encompassed the next 18 months or so starting with sophomore year of college. The first medication I was put on was Asacol, an anti-inflammatory drug used to treat inflammatory bowel diseases. A typical day was taking two pills each in the morning, afternoon, and night. I was also on daily supplements and vitamins. At first, it seemed like a lot, but like anything, you become used to it after a while.

So life was all good in Happy Valley. Classes got more difficult, but there was still plenty of time for fun and relaxation. Things like playing sports and going out on weekends were not an issue for me. I was eating normal…no restrictions. Sophomore year finished very differently than freshman year. I came back home to Pittsburgh in much higher spirits ready to enjoy a much needed summer.

The highlight of the summer was for sure the storm chase trip I went on across the Great Plains with my closest college friends. We ended up logging 3-4 thousand miles over the week long trip. We accomplished our goal of tracking down a few awesome thunderstorms, one to two of which were close to producing tornadoes. There were some very long days and tense moments, but it’s any weather enthusiast’s dream to go chase storms and for that, it was a very successful trip. More importantly though, I survived all those long driving stretches with no bathroom breaks. Looking back now, it was nice not having that issue on my mind.

After returning home and back to my summer job at a local greenhouse, I began to experience periodic stomach cramps. I normally wore a belt for work, but it came to a point where sometimes the tightness of the belt, which was never really that tight to begin with, around my waist was too much to handle. The bathroom trips were now becoming more frequent and there were even instances were I’d have blood in my stool. So its safe to say I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little concerned about what was beginning to happen.

I’d characterize the end of that summer as well as my junior year at college as the tremors you feel before an earthquake occurs. These were some of the issues that never fully went away from this time forward. But even so, I have to consider these times still part of the “calm” due to how much worse things actually got.

To show you things weren’t horrible, in August 2013, I was still able to participate in the Tough Mudder I had signed up for the prior March. Luckily, I had my best friend since preschool there the whole time in case anything happened. Before going back to college for the start of another year, I went back to my GI doctor and he switched me to Apriso, another anti-inflammatory drug. These pill capsules were really large and quite difficult to take at first, but the trade off was only having to take two a day in the morning.

School started up again and like always, it was great to be back with all my friends. Things weren’t too much different. The workload increased and so did the stress level, as I was now in a few leadership positions in some of our meteorology clubs. When my intestines wanted to spawn hell upon me, they could pretty much do so whenever they chose, but the more stressful times of junior year surely didn’t help the situation.

THERE’S NO EASY OR PRETTY WAY TO DESCRIBE THE SYMPTOMS OF A DISEASE LIKE ULCERATIVE COLITIS OR CROHN’S, SO THIS IS A DISCLAIMER THAT THINGS FROM HERE ON WILL START TO GET A LITTLE MORE GRAPHIC.

As a reference for future posts, I was easily in the “severe” category with my symptoms sometimes reaching “fulminant” (Thanks for these expertly taken notes, Phil Wright)

 

 

 

As winter approached, I was starting to use the bathroom more often than the earlier stages of my time on medications. More often than not, it was diarrhea and had some trace of blood…clearly not normal. This was the time where I started to notice certain foods creating more pain and increased bathroom trips than others. Leading the culprit list were dairy products and fatty, fried foods…literally a college student’s best friends, especially during the early morning hours of every Saturday and Sunday. BUT, I still had control of my bowels and was able to make it to the bathroom every time I had a stomach cramp or urge to go.

By the start of spring semester, I was beginning size up the battle I was involuntarily signed up for. A real kick in the nuts occurred when I was walking through a building on campus and a stomach cramp hit. I literally had the bathroom in sight, but just couldn’t make it (As a side note, I could tell you were every bathroom on that Penn State campus is…unfortunately haha).  I won’t go into any further detail, but man, that was a real shot to the morale meter. This is when I realized I was fighting something much bigger than your “take a couple pills and you’ll be better” illness.  These kind of incidents continued to occur throughtout the semester, but I’d like to think I was composed enough that I disguised any instances pretty well.

My close guy friends were a saving grace for me because I love to joke around a poke good-hearted fun at people…or myself, and that is exactly what I did. They were willing to listen to my stories and share a laugh with me. Not that I enjoyed making fun of myself, a grown 21 year-old man, for soiling my pants, but I sure as hell wasn’t going to go sit in a corner and sulk about it. That’s just wasn’t in my DNA. I had a degree to earn and a future to fulfill.

 

 

Part 1: The Beginning

Throughout high school, life was good. Life was real good! I was enjoying those last years at home before college like any other antsy high school upperclassman. Soccer was my passion since I was old enough to walk and that passion continued through high school as I was able to play during the spring and fall seasons with my closest friends. We were an unsung group of players with mediocre skill, but a chemistry unmatched by most teams we faced and that lead us to heights we sometimes didn’t expect. Those will be days I’ll look back upon for the rest of my life and know I have zero regrets about what we accomplished as a group.

I also ran the hurdles for our track team. Anyone who knows me well, will say I’m always the one doing crazy stunts that put my well-being in jeopardy. So the hurdles were a perfect match for me and they surely caused plenty of fall-induced brush burns and pain over the years. The 300m hurdles were my favorite event because I wasn’t as competitive in the 110m hurdles due to others having better technique than me. The 300m distance allowed me to put my speed to better use. I did quite well my senior year and came within one hurdle of potentially qualifying for states in the 300m hurdles. I tripped over the last hurdle I ever competitively ran in what would have been a personal best time for me and given me an outside shot of qualifying for states.

It’s crazy to think, but I may have hit my athletic peak during high school, something I did not think would be the case at the time.  Willing to let the sports spotlight go, it was time to become a small fish in a big pond and go pursue the academic career I wanted. It is safe to say I was the only one from my graduating class of approximately 350 students who went to pursue a degree in meteorology. The destination was Penn State University, located on a beautiful campus nestled in the college town of State College, Pennsylvania.

I had a great freshman year, meeting so many new friends, getting my fill of sports through pick-up games and intramurals, and most importantly, beginning my path to becoming a degreed meteorologist.

However, during the last week of that freshman year in May 2012, I began to have painful stomach cramps and found myself using the bathroom much more frequently than normal. Upon returning home to Pittsburgh after finals, I was in constant pain barely sleeping any at night. Good thing it was summer. I ended up going to see a gastrointestinal (GI) doctor and he said I needed to have a colonoscopy. Up to that point, the only thing I knew about a colonoscopy was that it was something you weren’t supposed to have until you were 50. Ugh…anyways, I had to go through with it and the dreadful news was delivered as positive for ulcerative colitis. At the time, this was a lot for me to process. I had no idea what ulcerative colitis was! Hearing the doctor describe it for me wasn’t a pretty thing to listen to. I was 19 at the time, but IMO, that’s something someone that age shouldn’t have to be told, just like any other chronic disease. We’re young, supposed to be healthy, and ready to conquer the world, right? Luckily, my youth and healthy, athletic lifestyle proved very beneficial in years to come.