The cost of sickness.

It’s been 3 months since I was hospitalised with my UC (Ulcerative Colitis) flare and today I’m celebrating being off steroids. Yesterday was my last pill. I don’t like drugs and I was afraid to take them but they did me good and I am grateful they calmed down my inflammation.

As wonderful as it is to be off the steroids and I am no way near as sick as I was, many of my symptoms are back and there’s no hiding from them behind drugs. This is where the real hard work starts, to further control my symptoms with my lifestyle = sleep, nutrition, movement and how I spend my time.

The truth is that sickness has a major cost. Beyond the obvious physical pain and visible symptoms there is a huge mental strain. Trying to alleviate the constant rumination: will it spread further? Will I get better and go back to ‘normal’? Will my biopsy have cancer this time?

And when I come to each day - what energy I have to put in to healing myself today? Which of the tools do I need to use? What is my body saying? Whilst trying to be a mum, a friend, a sister and a wife….and run two businesses.

And that’s just one thread of the cost of sickness.

There’s time

I have less of it. Needing to sleep more…

I spend a lot of time chasing down the useless pharmacy to make sure I have the drugs that, if I miss one day send me spiralling physically.

Managing the 4 different doctors I’m under and the appointments for gastro, heart, rheumatology, gyne, blood tests - all in the same month.

Planning my food, my meals. If I don’t do this I won’t eat. Food on the whole hurts my gut and if I’m not prepared I will just avoid.

The money

Good nutrition has a cost.

The treatments I have: massage, accupuncture are expensive.

The vits and supplements I take, the special teas I drink.

The work I’ve turned away because I simply cannot work as much as before.

The social impact

The things I can’t do, the friends I can’t see. The things I’ve missed. It’s only been 3.5 months but there are many.

= Isolation. I want nothing more than to leave the house and do more. I have to be so selective as one small thing will make me worse.

The moments I miss with Ziggy.

And physical

I lost a lot of weight. I’ve been weak and not been able to do my weights and maintain my strength.

It’s so ironic because the very things that UC has cost me are the very things that will make me better. I need to connect and socialise, to move, to relieve stress, access to meds and great nutrition. The balance is finding these in the doses that I can handle. But it takes energy itself to work all this out…often daily depending on how I feel each day. And the biggest irony of all is that very mental strain is what’s affecting the gut.

A very vicious cycle but one I’m determined to break.

Never one to back down, there’s no option but to accept and do everything I can, I’ve found the most impactful solutions to the biggest cost of all of this, my mental health, have been walking, journalling and meditating. Everyone and their aunt will preach these tools. I’ve tested it, they work. Of a morning, when I go for my phone, I meditate, journal (ie. dump all my worries) and at some point in the day go for a good walk. I make the right food choices through my day and get an early night. And that’s the sum of my very simple life right now.

Be grateful for the health you have,

L x

An adventure with Ziggy on a good day. Always the best of days.