Holiday food and colitis

I used to look forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas because of all the great food  my mom would make. But that was then and this is now—colitis rules my body and decides what I can eat.

Not being able to eat everything I want to eat has made me feel depressed and sometimes I avoid going to these food fests. Thankfully, family gatherings are mandatory and I would rather take a chance on the food rather than make my family feel slighted.

So instead of focusing on what I can’t eat, I try to focus on what I can eat. At Thanksgiving I was excited because I could eat turkey and mashed potatoes, without the gravy of course. I even made an awesome sandwich with my dinner roll, some turkey and mashed potatoes. I had to avoid any dishes like stuffing that contained onions, but I’m not a fan of stuffing anyway so that wasn’t a problem for me. For desert, I had small pieces of chocolate pie and cream cheese pie. I came away from the gathering without a stomach ache.

Now Christmas is coming up and I have to choose my food carefully again. My mom said she is having different types of soup. I can do soup as long as it isn’t spicy. I’m sure there will be other side dishes and deserts that I will have to choose wisely.

I’ve discovered since being diagnosed with ulcerative colitis that the one thing I have to avoid is stuffing myself. It has taken a lot of will power and lots of memories of having horrible stomach aches to convince me to not over eat.

The holidays can be difficult for those of us that have to watch what we eat, but with a little caution and discipline, the holidays can be a joyous time.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, Happy Holidays, Happy eating!

Colitis Chick

My mad colon

 

 

Coping with change

There’s the person I was and then there’s the person I’ve become. I went from being independent, active, determined and relatively healthy to becoming dependent, less active and unable to work, scared and somewhat bitter. For me, ulcerative colitis is more than just having diarrhea. UC zaps my energy and I feel sick all the time. Sometimes I think that maybe I didn’t change that much after all because I am still determined to fight this illness. If I wasn’t already a determined person, I think I would have given up long ago. I am battling depression and close to losing the fight. It’s not a fun place to be and determination is my strongest ally.

I think people learn to adapt to their situation and that’s what makes humans survivors. I have survived eleven years of this hell. Some of the ways I cope are by writing and reading, which are great escapes from reality. I try to spend time with friends and family—I’ve succeeded in the family part of this, but am failing in the friends’ part, unless you count the Internet as spending time with friends. I suppose that’s better than nothing. The truth is I have retreated from social situations like my writer’s group. I still belong to the group, but I don’t attend the meetings anymore, mainly because I am just too tired and I have to be realistic about what I am able to do in a day. I have to make sacrifices.

It’s just hard sometimes to think that I used to be so active and happy doing something I loved and now I struggle through each day. Sometimes I feel like I am falling into a black hole or just barely keeping my head out of the water. Overwhelmed is the best way to describe this feeling.

Change is never easy. I have to put that person I was away in a drawer somewhere and concentrate on the person I am now, to focus on the positives in my life—a caring family, devoted husband, my writing, my dogs and try to accept what is and forget what was. I have evolved even if it’s not the evolution I envisioned or wanted.

I see only one option if I am to live a somewhat normal life: accept what is.

Colitis Chick

My Mad Colon

Chronic fatigue and colitis

What I don’t understand is I feel tired all the time even when it seems like I am in remission, but I’m not even sure I know when I’m in remission. I thought a flare = blood in the stool, but that’s not always the case with me. The other thing is, I don’t have a severe case of colitis. Mine is in the lower part of my colon and compared to other colitis sufferers, my case is mild. So why am I tired all the time? I’m not anemic. It could be because people with colitis don’t absorb nutrients and that could make me tired. But all my blood tests are normal and my doctor checked my thyroid and that is normal. Also, my hormones are normal. So what’s up with me?

I feel so frustrated because I feel like crap and the doctors can’t find anything really serious, but I’m scared. Who wants to feel tired and crappy all the time? I wonder if it’s a combination of things that are making me feel so sick—colitis, arthritis and moderate allergies (that cause chronic sinusitis) can all cause a person to feel crappy. It’s to the point where I can’t work anymore and I HATE that. I’m even having some mental problems that are freaking me out. Am I depressed? I have no idea. I suppose I could be depressed. I have good cause to be depressed having to deal with not one, but several medical conditions.

I don’t think I eat well either. I keep reading that a person should eat at least nine servings of vegetables a day. Nine? I don’t even eat that much in a day. How am I supposed to get in nine servings of vegetables? Most days I don’t want to eat much at all. Is that the same for most colitis sufferers? I’m trying to make my lunch more nutritional. I told my doctor what I was eating for lunch—crackers with cream cheese and her response was that it wasn’t very nutritional and was more like a snack rather than a meal. Hmm. She’s probably right. I’m trying to make improvements to my lunch by adding some tuna salad instead of cream cheese to the crackers. Crackers feel better on my tummy. The thought of eating nine servings of anything a day makes me feel queasy.

What do people with colitis like to eat?

Colitis Chick

My mad and tired colon

 

Technorati Tags: ulcerative colitis,chronic fatigue,fatigue and colitis,foods for colitis flare,colitis,coping with colitis

Exercise is Good for the Soul and Colitis

Anyone who has ever suffered from chronic pain knows how hard it is to get up and do any type of exercise. Just getting out of bed can be Hell and the thought of going for a walk seems impossible. But it’s not. And I have discovered that doing some type of exercise actually helps the pain. Doctors used to tell patients suffering from arthritis to refrain from exercising because it could do further damage to their joints. Not any more. Now doctors encourage people with arthritis and other types of chronic pain to exercise to help strengthen joints and muscles. The pain can get worse without some exercise.

http://www.arthritis.org/exercise-intro.php

Now, when I say exercise, I’m not talking about high impact aerobics. Certain exercises could hurt joints and muscles. It’s best to check with a doctor or physical therapist to see what type of exercise works for you. All of the exercises I do I learned while in physical therapy and I know what might hurt me and what is good for my body. I walk and swim. I also have an elliptical machine because it gives me an impact-free workout, much easier on my joints than a treadmill. I really like it because it works out my whole body. I also do some stretching for my back, abdominal crunches to strengthen my back, lift hand weights for upper body strength and butt lifts for those buns of steel that I yearn to have, but have yet to achieve.

http://exercise.about.com/cs/exercisegear/a/treadelliptical.htm

There are some days when my energy level is so low that I can’t exercise or can only handle a light ten-minute workout. It’s important to listen to your body and learn what you can and can’t do. If exercise causes the pain to get worse, it’s best to stop.

Exercise is also good for colitis and maintaining colon health. It is a bit challenging for me though when I am in a flare because walking and moving certain parts of the body can make things move too fast through my digestive system. Not a good thing when out for a walk. This is a good time to listen to what the body is saying and alter the workout to do exercises that won’t irritate the flare. During a flare, I might exercise at home so I am close to a bathroom and I might skip the stomach crunches, especially if I am having severe stomach pain.

Exercise is the best thing you can do for your body and mental well-being. I enjoy walking early in the morning with my husband. It is our quiet, reflective time and also our time to converse about things we want to talk about without any interruptions. The mornings here are beautiful, the rising sun painting the mountains in pink and gold, illuminating between deep shadows and splashes of light. When exercising at home, I watch television, usually reruns of Charmed or Supernatural—not as breathtaking as the mountains, although the hot brothers in Supernatural come close, LOL—but watching television is a good way to pass the time on the elliptical.

Cheers and good health!

Colitis Chick

My mad colon

Technorati Tags: chronic pain,colitis,exercising,health tips,arthritis

Technorati Tags: colon health,relieving pain with exercise

What is chronic pain like?

Chronic pain is like the endless sound of death metal music—super distorted guitars and a gun machine beat with no melody in sight. The singer grinds out what sounds like the Devil’s throaty pitch. The pain, the music, rattles my skull all day and all night. Or sometimes the pain sounds like a large rock being run over by a lawn mower, the blade grinding the stone in an ear-splitting roar. I cover my ears and it still doesn’t go away.

Chronic pain is like the stench of rotten meat or burnt flesh, stinging my nose, my eyes, and making me retch—over and over again. The awful smell follows me around every day.

Chronic pain is like the endless sight of a diseased foot with fungus or pus-filled sores. Or like a maggot-infested corpse. These repulsive visions remain in my head all the time even when I try to see something beautiful like a rose or a sunset.

Chronic pain tastes like this horrible-tasting antibiotic I had to take, which had a bitter, metallic aftertaste that made me wince and gag every time I had to swallow it. Or sometimes the pain tastes like sour milk. The horrible taste never leaves my mouth.

What is chronic pain like to you?

Cheers and good health!

Colitis Chick

My mad colon

Technorati Tags: chronic pain,chronic diseases,ulcerative colitis,inflammatory bowel disease,health issues,coping with colitis,self help,humorous articles,venting,ranting,dealing with chronic pain

The Simple Things in Life

Living with chronic pain for about ten years has made me appreciate the simple things more. Just being able to get out of bed in the morning is cause for celebration. This probably sounds pathetic to healthy people and that’s okay. I never would have thought that the highlight of my day would be a morning walk. That morning walk is kind of cool though, sort of Zen-like with the way the sun rises over the mountains in a mix of dramatic shadows and red-gold light. I could use more moments like that to keep the stress away.

Life used to move fast for me with full time work and hanging at bars/clubs on the weekend, but now my favorite day is Sunday—movie day here at the house. Because of my illness, I can’t drink anymore and staying out all night makes me feel like crap. So, instead of going out drinking and listening to live bands (or being in the band because I used to play in a hard rock band), I look forward to movie day.

Other simple things I enjoy are gazing at sunrises, sunsets, moon and starlit skies from my yard. I also keep myself from going insane by writing (I am a published author) and reading anything from historical novels, fantasy or paranormal romances. This is much different from my old fast-paced life. And it doesn’t bother me that much either. In fact, I have grown used to this slower pace and I actually like it.

I think it’s better to surrender to the illness and roll with the changes it brings. It seems to work for me. Find that Zen-like place that makes you feel good.

Cheers and good health!

Colitis Chick

My mad colon

Technorati Tags: ulcerative colitis,chronic diseases,coping with colitis,living with a chronic disease,enjoying the simple things in life,zen-like moments,health issues

Technorati Tags: living with chronic pain

Chrohn’s or Colitis?

I have no idea what is going on with me. Supposedly I have left-sided ulcerative colitis, but I have been having right sided pain and a lot of stomach problems that don’t seem to belong to colitis. I was also really tired, a scary kind of tired different from my usual fatigue, where I thought something was really wrong.

I saw my doctor recently and told him how sick I have been, the right side pain, blah, blah, blah and asked him if this was normal for colitis. He didn’t think so, but thought I had a secondary infection. The antibiotic he gave me specifically treats stomach infections and when I looked it up later, I noticed it is used to treat people with Chrohn’s disease. Chrohn’s is kind of similar to Ulcerative Colitis except that it affects the small and large intestine and can affect the anywhere from the mouth to the rectum. I think it is worse than colitis because it can affect the entire gastrointestinal tract and it would explain why I have been so sick. The problem is it is really hard to tell the two apart and difficult to diagnose.

Here is a link to more info on Chrohn’s disease and the different types: http://ibdcrohns.about.com/od/cdbeyondbasics/a/crohnstypes.htm

This link also shows some of the differences in the two diseases:

http://www.ehealthmd.com/library/ulcerativecolitis/UC_whatis.html

So, do I have Chrohn’s disease? Who knows? My doctor didn’t say anything and maybe it doesn’t really matter as long as I respond to the treatments. It appears Chrohn’s and UC are treated basically the same anyway. If I get sick like that again than maybe it will be time for more tests, but I don’t really want more tests. I hate tests and not sure they really help anyway. I have a chronic disease. That I know. As long as I have my appetite back, my tummy isn’t hurting too bad and I am back to my normal pain and fatigue, I’m good.

Cheers and good health!

Colitis Chick

My mad colon

Technorati Tags: ulcerative colitis,chronic diseases,inflammatory bowel disease,chrohn's disease

Sick of Being Sick

I feel like my life has been stolen from me. After dealing with one chronic illness for ten years and another one for three, I feel like I am going crazy. I can't get my life together because I always seem to be starting over. I'm sick so much that I can't keep a job and I feel like a loser. I have tried everything I can think of to stay healthy. I eat right to manage the colitis, I do my exercises to help with my chronic pain and I don't go out and party anymore, but I still can't stay healthy for very long. My doctors don't seem to know what to do with me other than to prescribe pills. I believe that the mind can heal the body, but positive thinking only goes so far. It's a temporary fix for me. And when I see other people with a chronic illness able to live an active life, I wonder what I am doing wrong.

I feel so exhausted trying to deal with being sick all the time. Try to imagine being sick with a flu-like bug every single day. That’s pretty close to what I have to deal with. It’s impossible to hold down a job and a battle to do regular, simple every day things like take a shower or grocery shopping. It involves a lot of willpower and drugs to be able to function at all. It’s real easy and tempting for me to fall into a black hole, but I am lucky to have a caring husband and family. And two dogs that need me to care for them. That’s a good motivator.

Sometimes I just want to scream. Will this ever end? Not likely. I try not to think of my future. If I do it just makes me scared and crazy. Wow, it turns out that ranting like this actually does help to brighten a dark mood. Cool.

Cheers and stay healthy!

Colitis Chick

My colon is really mad today

Technorati Tags: ulcerative colitis,coping with colitis,chronic diseases,ranting,health issues

Misunderstood

Sometimes it's hard to deal with an unseen disease. What I mean is that from the outside, I don't really look sick, I'm not in a wheel chair or I don't have a cast on any of my limbs. If one would look close enough, they would notice that I often look tired, but that is the only real indication that I am sick. While I may look healthy on the outside, I feel horrible on the inside. I don't think people understand when I make excuses to stay home and not participate because they don't know I am sick. And telling them I am sick is just as frustrating because I don't want to have to explain my illness. I'm not one to whine and complain to people, except to my husband or close family members. I don't think it's anyone's business. But then I feel like people think I'm weird. And then I believe that I am weird. Do I shy away from having to socialize because I am sick or is it because I hate to socialize? After a while, I don't know.

I wonder if other people with a chronic illness feel the same way—misunderstood.

Cheers and good health!

Colitis Chick

My mad colon

Technorati Tags: ulcerative colitis,chronic diseases,coping with colitis

Colitis is a Systemic Disease

Apparently, I am a medical anomaly. I have a case of ulcerative colitis, but of course, it can't be a normal case. My colitis affects other areas of my body: mainly my lower back joints. I also have chronic pain all over my body that may or may not have to do with colitis. Who knows? My doctors certainly don't know. From the beginning they were scratching their heads when I ended up in the emergency room with severe back and leg pain, symptoms that pointed to a herniated disc, but that made no sense because I had not been involved in any accidents or falls.

The back pain had been building for weeks and not responding to any anti-inflammatory meds and then I started to have an electric shock down my backside and leg that indicated sciatica. Then one day the pain got much worse and I couldn't lift my arms. My leg pain was so bad I wanted to chop my leg off. Not kidding. I had also been having pelvic pain on and off and flu-like symptoms, including a strange itchy rash on my back. Whatever kind of flare up I had it was really bad, bad enough to make me unable to walk or do anything for about six months. I couldn't feel most of my right leg—it either hurt like hell or it felt like my leg was asleep. When doctors finally got around to doing any blood tests whatever caused the flare was long gone except for a bladder infection. I was diagnosed with reactive arthritis or Reiter’s Syndrome even though I didn’t have some of the main symptoms for Reiter’s. It's obvious that there had to be something else present to cause such a flare—a virus maybe or colitis? This happened in 2000. I wasn't diagnosed with colitis until 2007, but I had been suffering from chronic pain, back pain (Sacroiliitis) and fatigue all those years. Doctors back then kept asking me if I had any diarrhea, but I hadn't. I did, however, complain of constipation.

I recently read something about colitis and how sometimes it presents as constipation. So have I had colitis all that time, but didn't have the 'normal' symptoms until much later? It's possible. My doctors now think there is a connection.

I also found out that colitis is a systemic disease and can affect areas outside the colon, including the mouth (ulcers), eye inflammations, Musculoskeletal complications like Seronegative arthritis which can affect one or two large joints or smaller joints like hands and feet, Ankylosing spondylitis—arthritis of the spine, Sacroiliitis—arthritis of the lower spine, Cutaneous (relating to the skin) inflammation of subcutaneous tissue involving lower extremities and Pyoderma Gangrenosum—painful skin lesion, Deep venous thrombosis and pulmonary embolism, Autoimmune hemolytic anemia, Clubbing—deformity of ends of fingers and Inflammation of the bile ducts.

http://health.learninginfo.org/ulcerative-colitis.htm

Anyone else have any weird medical stories to share? There's so much that doctors still don't understand about the body and disease. The human body is truly mysterious.

Cheers and good health!

Colitis Chick

My mad colon

Technorati Tags: ulcerative colitis,reactive arthritis,reiter's syndrome,systemic colitis,sacroiliitis,constipation,chronic diseases,inflammatory bowel disease,self help,health issues

Technorati Tags: systemic diseases