where do we go from here?

A few years back, I was blissfully unaware of the pain A began experiencing on July 4th after eating Arby’s for lunch. We had plans to go down to Philadelphia with friends for the big concert and fireworks display. I was busy making a bag to take with us, and excited about crossing 4th of July in Philly off the bucket list. Looking back at the blog post I made, Anthony doesn’t look well at all. It was probably one of the most uncomfortable days of his life and I forced him to go with us. The guilt I feel about this still haunts me (though he never led on to how bad it was). It took him over a week to finally confess that he wasn’t feeling well and that we need to go to a doctor. Reflecting back on that time, I have no idea how A didn’t land himself in the hospital from dehydration. He was originally diagnosed with E.coli, but after further investigation, it was the beginning symptoms of ulcerative colitis. If A catches wind of this blog, he will be ever so embarrassed that I’m spilling his “secret” to the blog-world, but my hope is that others in similar situations can find solace and resources here. I’ve spent countless hours reading books, websites, blogs and more to figure out what’s the best way to minimize the symptoms and get Anthony healthy; researching seemed the only thing I could do to help. He’d been on some form or another of steroids for the better part of 7 months to try to get his colon calmed. To bring up all the side effects from the steroids alone makes me sick to my stomach. I’m ready to get drastic and take a leap off an edge that A isn’t ready for. One day soon, I have faith, that he will be able to live a life that isn’t centered around the possibility of another long flareup as this one has been.

The end of April through the middle of September 2013 – that’s the time that our life was on hold due to UC. Anthony had to scale back on going to the gym and ended up working from home most days – it was excruciatingly painful for him. During those 5ish months, he was a hermit (which isn’t that uncommon but it was an extreme). There were no more walks around the neighborhood, going out to eat, visiting with friends, or even watching a movie at home. We had grand plans that summer to travel and check off more items on our adventures list as well as finish the dissertation. By the time September rolled around + A started feeling better, we were shocked what little we both accomplished. The flare up calmed just in time for me to get incredibly business with my photography business while Anthony went into overdrive, frantically writing his dissertation, applying to roughly 70 jobs, working in the Special Collections at the library, and spending about an hour a night having dinner/talking/catching up on our shows.

This post is two-fold. One I wanted to let the secret of ulcerative colitis out of the bag and then tell you a bit about our future (it goes hand-in-hand I promise). Being sick for the entire summer put the dissertation on hold, setting A back about 4 months. After the new year, he was still applying to jobs and trying so hard to finish the dissertation. The deadline to turn it in passed by a week, and we got the news that he wouldn’t graduate middle of April. I was selfishly devastated and heartbroken. That meant he wouldn’t be graduating with the rest of the classmates he entered with and we’d most likely still be here at PTS for our SEVENTH YEAR!!!! It took about a week for me to get over myself and see that God has bigger plans for us. But really, I didn’t want to live in Princeton for 7 years folks. I wanted it to be 4 years, 5 at the max.

Our future involves staying in Princeton at least one more year. I’m at peace with this, I promise. Anthony has several opportunities this semester and God will put the most AMAZING job in our laps next year.

Thanks for reading my ramblings!