According to the Crohn's and Colitis Foundation of America, Crohn's disease is "a chronic inflammatory condition of the gastrointestinal tract," but to those with Crohn's disease it is more complicated than that. If you didn't guess, I have Crohn's disease and I've found that a lot of people have heard of it, yet have no idea what it means. This isn't an article to gain sympathy, its intention is to remove the embarrassment that comes with talking about the disease. Telling people that I have been diagnosed with Crohn's disease has been hard because you know they will ask what that means if they don't already know. How do you gracefully define what it means to have a digestive disease? I have been really lucky comparatively, in part because I have only been dealing with the disease for just over a year, and also because I haven't suffered as many of the symptoms as others do. The symptoms include diarrhea, nausea, weight loss, fatigue, and abdominal cramping. These can be extremely humiliating and at times hinder regular life. If you've ever been doubled over with cramps or had a spout of diarrhea you know that it is hard to live normally for that time period. These "flare-ups" can occur even if you eat the restrictive diet and go to the treatments.
Every eight weeks--like clockwork--I go to get an infusion of a drug called Remicade to treat my Crohn's disease. It is basically sitting in a chair for two hours while you are infused with the medicine via IV, unpleasant but not horrible. I'm nineteen, but because I was diagnosed just days after my eighteenth birthday I go to a pediatric hospital for my infusions and that reminds me how lucky I am. The youngest person I've seen in the infusion center has been a toddler; the youngest patient my GI doctor has is only a baby. This is a chronic disease with no cure, embarrassing symptoms, expensive medicines, and requires a special diet.
Since being diagnosed, I have had two abdominal surgeries, the second due to the severity of the first and there is always a chance that another surgery could be necessary. Even with treatment, up to 75% of Crohn's patients will have to have surgery. I have spent around a month and a half in hospitals in the past year or so which besides sucking because it's a hospital, is expensive. I'm lucky enough to have really good medical insurance that covers most of the costs, but it is still expensive.
I have worked Crohn's disease into my life, it sucks, but like all of the other Crohn's patients, I manage. And again this article isn't meant to encourage sympathy for people who suffer from Crohn's disease, it's to take away the stigma of talking about it and to help others understand it a little better.
