By Grady Stewart
“Tired of feeling dizzy from my situation, I realized I had a choice. I could let anger drive my college experience, or I could appreciate the things I was capable of doing. “
I lived in a dorm building named South Hall when I was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis. It was four floors of ambitious and energetic college freshman. At night, I could hear a wavy hum of untapped potential buzzing in the air. The beginning of college, or the beginning of anything, really, is always incredibly alive with possibility. I was surrounded by other students who were tired of waiting. Together, we all marched headlong in any adventure that awaited us. We were adults at last. It was our time.
The community atmosphere and energy of college is rarely found anywhere else. Specifically, the college dorm is the world’s most diverse ecosystem. You throw a few hundred students who come from different places and who have different backgrounds into one building. You tell them to coexist, and somehow, it’s self sustaining.
While college is a time of new friendships and experiences, it’s also easy to blend into the bustling background of daily college life. Adulthood comes with stacks of new responsibilities. It’s cutting the ropes that have anchored your life, and sailing off into the unknown. Independence means making difficult and often ambiguous decisions on your own. Living with a chronic illness, such as Crohn’s disease or ulcerative colitis, complicates young adulthood even further.
Many of my classmates were seemingly able to attend class, complete household chores, and party every weekend with ease. For me, however, it was a challenge. It was difficult to look around at the thousands of students surrounding me and see them achieving things that felt impossible to me. It’s frustrating to have persistent anxiety about where the nearest bathroom is, when for others it’s an afterthought. Simply put, my first taste of freedom was bittersweet. Like Prednisone, the aftertaste lingered and was hard to swallow.
It’s isolating to feel weak and abnormal. Moreover, physically living in a dorm room can be lonely. Other students were able to roam the campus without any concern, but often I confined myself to my dorm due to pain. I felt regret at not being able to fully experience certain aspects of college life. Chronic illness is a spiral that envelops your life. It spun around me until everything else in life was blurry. Tired of feeling dizzy from my situation, I realized I had a choice. I could let anger drive my college experience, or I could appreciate the things I was capable of doing.
There’s no clear solution to unraveling the sticky web of chronic illness. Everyone has a different relationship to their body and their health. Everyone has a different path to college, their career, or adult life in general. Today, I’ve graduated from college and survived numerous triumphs and setbacks. I have a full time job, and get excited about buying snacks in bulk from Costco. Clearly, I’m a real adult. One of the keys to embracing life with ulcerative colitis or Crohn’s is embracing change.
It’s easier written, or said, than done. However, I believe that illness is not an impenetrable barrier. It’s an obstacle, a heavy boulder, that patients must carry. Still, everyday that I live with ulcerative colitis, I learn something new about myself. As a result, it’s become easier to adapt to life with illness. I know my strengths and my weaknesses, and I have gotten stronger. My experiences have made it easier to move, while carrying the weight of my diagnosis. Transitions, like from college to employment, are not impossible for me, instead they provide an opportunity for me to overcome my illness. After all, I have IBD, but I am not my disease. In the end, I know the boulder of IBD will erode into a tiny pebble. Until then, I’ll keep living beyond my limitations.