The diagnosis

The summer of 2004 was a tough time for me, life changing actually. Before this point I was like any other person my age. I'd grown up a happy kid. I took ballet classes, played on a softball team, and sang in chorus. Granted I was the smallest and slowest on the team, but I just thought that was me. At some point during the summer my grandparents took my cousins and I to Michigan to visit family. The only thing I remember is sleeping, eating little, and sleeping some more. On the way back home my aunt caught me throwing up in a bathroom an decided I needed to go to the doctor. That place had always put me on edge. As my feet dangled nervously, the doctors questions eventually took a concerning turn. "Are there problems at home? Do you get enough to eat? Do you get booboos a lot?" Once I convinced her my parents werent abusing me she took some blood and sent us on our way. After a while I didnt even think about it, but not so long after I found myself back in the office waiting on results. I can't recall her delivery, but I left knowing I had something called Crohns disease. I didn't know it then, but once I left that appointment, I was no longer an average 8 year old. All the sudden liquid cold medicine wasnt the hardest thing to swallow. Soon I was missing school, wearing hospital gowns, and I was seeing more needles than friends. I remember returning to school after that summer. I saw one of my friends, Serena Hull, ran up to her and I was devastated. I had gained so much weight from the steroids she couldnt even reconize me. Of course she didnt mean to hurt my feelings, we were young and she didnt know what was going on with me. I think that was the first time I knew things would never going to be the same, I would never be the same, and not everyone would be able to understand that.