I write to you now from an undignified ball position on my bed, where I am alternating grading papers and falling dead asleep. This morning, I ran nine miles for Crohn's Half-Marathon Training (it was supposed to be 8.5 miles, but did not take into account my poor sense of direction). I had every intention of doing this at a noble strolling pace, but it turned out that if I wanted to keep on course, I had to keep the rest of the group in my line of sight. Good-bye, noble stroll. Hello, running interspersed with occasional Jane-Fondaesque speed-walking.
I sort of liked having to run as fast as I could to keep the group in sight, particularly with all the turns. It was sort of Bourne Identityish for a while there. There they were rounding the corner! Quick, get them before they melt into the oncoming crowd! There's a bomb under that car! A really hot French woman wants to make out with me! I'm sailing away from this building by convenient steel cable!
Toward the end, however, I was beginning to lose hold of the conceit that I was Jason Bourne in a CCFA running shirt, making my way through the Marina to cure Crohn's Disease, and began to just feel really, really tired instead.
"Just finish," I thought, which swiftly gave way to creepy out-loud exhortations of "Just finish," and then, "Come on, just finish," and then, "Just finish, just finish, just finish, you're finishing, you're doing it, you're finishing," and then, before I knew it, I had done it. I'd finished it. Nine miles. Running.
"It's so hard to be in The Bourne Identity!" I told the group. They smiled kindly, as nice people will smile at the slightly deranged.
Fast-forward about forty-five minutes to Fort Phil Collins, where after a shower and an egg, I slept for three hours straight. Then I woke up, drank some Emergen-C, ate half an avocado, and went back to sleep again. If allowed, I think I would sleep for hundreds of years. How do people run long distances and then lead regular lives? I think I just expended the amount of energy it takes me to conduct a normal week of business.
What I'd really like to do is crawl into a cave in the Arctic with several hundred pounds of seal and sleep out the winter, like a bear. But I'm not going to do that (at least not yet). Grading calls. So much grading. And you know what? I'm a roll here; I'm going to finish that too.
Saturday, October 23, 2010
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
just finish
I've been a bad, bad marathoner.
A few weeks of suffocating workload followed by a week of colonoscopy + Tysabri somehow resulted in three (count them, three) missed weeks of training. In my defense, I had to finish the work or I would have been fired. And you can't really run when you're under anesthesia with a tube up your ass (if you can do this, please contact me: We have a lot to talk about).
However, the frigid truth remains that I will, come hell or high water, be completing the half marathon on December 5 on behalf of the CCFA, and I will be raising that money for research for our intestines, and I will set a good example for other Crohns who think they may want to run a half-marathon someday, for whatever deeply disturbed reason.
Today I went back to training. I did it on a treadmill at the gym, with the assistance of Pandora's Akon radio. (This was a special occasion, as I usually save Akon for writing, but I divined that I would need the extra push of the Soul Poet today.) I was right. This run was... just short of a near-death experience. Even with walk breaks. Even with Akon. Even with a voice inside my head alternating furiously between stick and carrot:
Voice A: Move it, you sorry sack of brussels sprouts! What a disgrace.
Voice B: You can do it! Great job! Just a few more miles!
Voice A: Is that the best you can do? I'm appalled!
Voice B: This is great! Look at you!
I finished. Not gracefully, but I finished.
And that's just what I'm going to do on December 5.
After my colonoscopy last week, I received the best report I've had in 19+ years of Crohn's Disease. This is probably the healthiest I'll ever be (unless a cure is found, in which case, whoa, everyone). But that doesn't mean I can do more than I've ever done before. In fact, it may mean the opposite. To keep my Crohn's in this kind of remission, my body is working extremely hard. It takes energy to stay in remission. And being given a good report at the doctor's office after 20 years of Crohn's isn't the same as being given that same report after 3 years, or 6 years, or 9 years. The effects are cumulative, your body gets older, and the apex of your physical ability isn't constant --- no matter how "well" you are.
There's a part of me that, in the spirit of Voice A, tells me I have no excuse but to run as fast and as hard and as long as anyone else. After all, I got a great report at the doctor's office. I'm in remission. But the other part of me knows I don't need an excuse. I don't need an excuse for anything. I'm already going above and beyond what my body can do, whether I run or walk or crawl the half marathon. Does this mean I can't do what other people can do? Absolutely not. It just means I have to do it differently.
I know a lot of you struggle with this back-and-forth too. I'm well/I'm sick; I'm normal/I'm different; I can/I can't. You can. You may just have to find your own way of doing what you want to do. I know people look down on those who walk the lion's share of a marathon, or who need breaks, or who run slowly. But I don't care about those people. I care about us. I'm finishing the race. I'm doing it my way.
PS. In the coming weeks I'll be posting more about my runs and my progress. If you want to support my run for more and better CCFA research and haven't had a chance yet, there's still plenty of time. Just click here.
A few weeks of suffocating workload followed by a week of colonoscopy + Tysabri somehow resulted in three (count them, three) missed weeks of training. In my defense, I had to finish the work or I would have been fired. And you can't really run when you're under anesthesia with a tube up your ass (if you can do this, please contact me: We have a lot to talk about).
However, the frigid truth remains that I will, come hell or high water, be completing the half marathon on December 5 on behalf of the CCFA, and I will be raising that money for research for our intestines, and I will set a good example for other Crohns who think they may want to run a half-marathon someday, for whatever deeply disturbed reason.
Today I went back to training. I did it on a treadmill at the gym, with the assistance of Pandora's Akon radio. (This was a special occasion, as I usually save Akon for writing, but I divined that I would need the extra push of the Soul Poet today.) I was right. This run was... just short of a near-death experience. Even with walk breaks. Even with Akon. Even with a voice inside my head alternating furiously between stick and carrot:
Voice A: Move it, you sorry sack of brussels sprouts! What a disgrace.
Voice B: You can do it! Great job! Just a few more miles!
Voice A: Is that the best you can do? I'm appalled!
Voice B: This is great! Look at you!
I finished. Not gracefully, but I finished.
And that's just what I'm going to do on December 5.
After my colonoscopy last week, I received the best report I've had in 19+ years of Crohn's Disease. This is probably the healthiest I'll ever be (unless a cure is found, in which case, whoa, everyone). But that doesn't mean I can do more than I've ever done before. In fact, it may mean the opposite. To keep my Crohn's in this kind of remission, my body is working extremely hard. It takes energy to stay in remission. And being given a good report at the doctor's office after 20 years of Crohn's isn't the same as being given that same report after 3 years, or 6 years, or 9 years. The effects are cumulative, your body gets older, and the apex of your physical ability isn't constant --- no matter how "well" you are.
There's a part of me that, in the spirit of Voice A, tells me I have no excuse but to run as fast and as hard and as long as anyone else. After all, I got a great report at the doctor's office. I'm in remission. But the other part of me knows I don't need an excuse. I don't need an excuse for anything. I'm already going above and beyond what my body can do, whether I run or walk or crawl the half marathon. Does this mean I can't do what other people can do? Absolutely not. It just means I have to do it differently.
I know a lot of you struggle with this back-and-forth too. I'm well/I'm sick; I'm normal/I'm different; I can/I can't. You can. You may just have to find your own way of doing what you want to do. I know people look down on those who walk the lion's share of a marathon, or who need breaks, or who run slowly. But I don't care about those people. I care about us. I'm finishing the race. I'm doing it my way.
PS. In the coming weeks I'll be posting more about my runs and my progress. If you want to support my run for more and better CCFA research and haven't had a chance yet, there's still plenty of time. Just click here.
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
day at the office
Yesterday, I drank some gallons of GoLitely. I vomited up some gallons of GoLitely. I responded according to the hopes and dreams and intentions of GoLitely. I also had three conference calls with students, graded four early drafts of their papers due tomorrow, and edited the first six chapters of my novel, which I am (gulp) sending (gulp) into the (gulp) atmosphere tomorrow.
Today Good Buddy Shaina drove to me to the hospital.
I'll tell you what: There's something strange about the anteroom in the endoscopy suite, about all the patients lined up foot-by-foot in our identical beds with our identical hospital gowns and identical oxygen nose tubes. Some of them had already had their procedures and were knocked out. Some, like me, were waiting. There was a man about my age in the bed next to me, hyperventilating.
The nurse told him, "Deep breaths! Look at this young lady here!" She indicated me. "See how smiley she is! See how this is no big deal for her? This is just like a day at the office for her!"
I smiled to show him it really was just like a day at the office. Another nurse jabbed a big needle into my wrist and set up my IV. She was wiggling it around to get into the vein. I kept smiling at the man.
Then they put on my little chest leads and my oxygen nose tubes. The man had apparently found some sort of zen point in me; he would not take his eyes off. I kept smiling. Keep smiling for that man, I told myself. It seemed like he really needed it. And the truth was, sadly or not, it really was kind of like a day at the office for me. Not only because I'm so comfortable in hospitals now, but also because getting bits of my intestines shaved out isn't actually more taxing to me than holding office hours. I enjoy office hours, but when I come home, I usually throw up or have a fever. Big, big smile.
As they wheeled me away I told the guy, "Don't worry. Maybe when they put you to sleep you'll have a prophetic dream." This, actually, did not seem to help.
When I woke up a few hours later, the doctor informed me --- here, you could probably fill in the blank as well as I --- that, well, I have Crohn's Disease. (There is a little part of me that always hopes she will say, "It's a miracle! We've never seen anything like this before! After twenty years, magically, you don't have Crohn's Disease! You are the first cured patient in history! You are free!")
But then she told me that after 13 months of Tysabri, the improvement is "very good." In other words, my intestines look a heck of a lot better than they did when I was under the employ of That University Where I Teach. She gave me the pictures so I could see. An early-90s David Bowie bust could be seen somewhere in the ileum, but other than that, it just looked like an intestine with Crohn's Disease. But not one that was going to die.
As I was groggily putting my shoes on I saw the Hyperventilator waking up beside me.
"Did you have a prophetic dream?" I asked.
He smiled at me, still a bit drugged.
"I dreamed this wasn't my life," he said.
Today Good Buddy Shaina drove to me to the hospital.
I'll tell you what: There's something strange about the anteroom in the endoscopy suite, about all the patients lined up foot-by-foot in our identical beds with our identical hospital gowns and identical oxygen nose tubes. Some of them had already had their procedures and were knocked out. Some, like me, were waiting. There was a man about my age in the bed next to me, hyperventilating.
The nurse told him, "Deep breaths! Look at this young lady here!" She indicated me. "See how smiley she is! See how this is no big deal for her? This is just like a day at the office for her!"
I smiled to show him it really was just like a day at the office. Another nurse jabbed a big needle into my wrist and set up my IV. She was wiggling it around to get into the vein. I kept smiling at the man.
Then they put on my little chest leads and my oxygen nose tubes. The man had apparently found some sort of zen point in me; he would not take his eyes off. I kept smiling. Keep smiling for that man, I told myself. It seemed like he really needed it. And the truth was, sadly or not, it really was kind of like a day at the office for me. Not only because I'm so comfortable in hospitals now, but also because getting bits of my intestines shaved out isn't actually more taxing to me than holding office hours. I enjoy office hours, but when I come home, I usually throw up or have a fever. Big, big smile.
As they wheeled me away I told the guy, "Don't worry. Maybe when they put you to sleep you'll have a prophetic dream." This, actually, did not seem to help.
When I woke up a few hours later, the doctor informed me --- here, you could probably fill in the blank as well as I --- that, well, I have Crohn's Disease. (There is a little part of me that always hopes she will say, "It's a miracle! We've never seen anything like this before! After twenty years, magically, you don't have Crohn's Disease! You are the first cured patient in history! You are free!")
But then she told me that after 13 months of Tysabri, the improvement is "very good." In other words, my intestines look a heck of a lot better than they did when I was under the employ of That University Where I Teach. She gave me the pictures so I could see. An early-90s David Bowie bust could be seen somewhere in the ileum, but other than that, it just looked like an intestine with Crohn's Disease. But not one that was going to die.
As I was groggily putting my shoes on I saw the Hyperventilator waking up beside me.
"Did you have a prophetic dream?" I asked.
He smiled at me, still a bit drugged.
"I dreamed this wasn't my life," he said.
Monday, October 11, 2010
do you celiac what i celiac
In the period I've been away, I've been primarily doing three things.
1) Grading papers analyzing induction and deduction.
2) Copyediting manuscripts about 14-year-old girls whose romantic lives are in fact far more titillating than my own.
3) Not eating gluten.
Oh, I know what I said. How my love for pizza and sandwiches trumped the trends, how I always felt fine no matter what I ate, be it broth or shrapnel. But it turns out that the symptoms of gluten intolerance aren't always gastrointestinal. Sometimes, for example, an unresolved gluten intolerance can make you, well, extremely depressed.
I went to a doctor who marveled that in 19+ years of Crohn's Disease, I'd never been tested for celiac. And in the two weeks since that appointment, I've forgone the gluten and witnessed mood changes of spectacular proportions. That's not to say this was a quick fix, or that all the issues I was having are resolved. But I do feel a bit better. And eating gluten-free has been, so far, not difficult at all. If you know me at all, you know I rather like a challenge. Better if that challenge involves bread, but whatever. Beggars can't be choosers.
Today I'm not eating gluten-free foods at all, though. Today I'm not eating anything. Today, Crohns, I am drinking. Oh yes, it's GoLitely time up in here. Tomorrow I will have my annual colonoscopy (apparently I'm a 50-year-old man) and in preparation, I'm taking those awful tablets and drinking that awful stuff.
I don't know about you, but that stuff makes me extremely sick. Allergic skin reactions, vomiting, fever. Hate this stuff. Hate, hate, hate. And you know when they get in there tomorrow they're just going to conclude that... oh, my god!... no, wait, what's this?... sound the alarm!... It's Crohn's Disease!
To those of you who emailed me after the last post, thank you. Thank you for your insights and your support, and most of all for your patience. You're a pretty solid bunch, you know that? Good heads on your shoulders! Who raised you? I like them too.
1) Grading papers analyzing induction and deduction.
2) Copyediting manuscripts about 14-year-old girls whose romantic lives are in fact far more titillating than my own.
3) Not eating gluten.
Oh, I know what I said. How my love for pizza and sandwiches trumped the trends, how I always felt fine no matter what I ate, be it broth or shrapnel. But it turns out that the symptoms of gluten intolerance aren't always gastrointestinal. Sometimes, for example, an unresolved gluten intolerance can make you, well, extremely depressed.
I went to a doctor who marveled that in 19+ years of Crohn's Disease, I'd never been tested for celiac. And in the two weeks since that appointment, I've forgone the gluten and witnessed mood changes of spectacular proportions. That's not to say this was a quick fix, or that all the issues I was having are resolved. But I do feel a bit better. And eating gluten-free has been, so far, not difficult at all. If you know me at all, you know I rather like a challenge. Better if that challenge involves bread, but whatever. Beggars can't be choosers.
Today I'm not eating gluten-free foods at all, though. Today I'm not eating anything. Today, Crohns, I am drinking. Oh yes, it's GoLitely time up in here. Tomorrow I will have my annual colonoscopy (apparently I'm a 50-year-old man) and in preparation, I'm taking those awful tablets and drinking that awful stuff.
I don't know about you, but that stuff makes me extremely sick. Allergic skin reactions, vomiting, fever. Hate this stuff. Hate, hate, hate. And you know when they get in there tomorrow they're just going to conclude that... oh, my god!... no, wait, what's this?... sound the alarm!... It's Crohn's Disease!
To those of you who emailed me after the last post, thank you. Thank you for your insights and your support, and most of all for your patience. You're a pretty solid bunch, you know that? Good heads on your shoulders! Who raised you? I like them too.
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