The Regular Ulcerative Colitis Poll One Person Voted Against, No.2

Who thinks Bill Foster, Michael Douglas’s character in Falling Down was heading for a UC flare-up? If the comments people left are anything to go by my post on stress and ulcerative colitis seemed to hit a nerve. It seems we all have an opinion on the subject. So let’s put it to the poll and see what comes out.

The Regular Ulcerative Colitis Poll One Person Voted Against, No.2

Do you believe stress has an effect on your UC? Maybe Definitely Not at all I haven't got time for all this I've got a million and one more important things to think about instead of some silly poll, sheesh Current Results

Wednesday's diary on a Thursday 3.3

I know what you're thinking - why can't it be WDOAT every day? I agree, but if we had WDOAT every day there would be nothing to look forward to. Ever. So here it is, the weekly, and it will always remain weekly, WDOAT.

Wednesday 27th February:
6am Firmish stool, very light blood
1.45pm Firmish stool

Medication:
6 x Mesalazine 400mg
3 x Azathioprine 50mg
3 x Ferrous Sulphate 200mg

Comments:
Yada yada yada.

The waiting game

You get all sorts in hospital waiting rooms, don’t you? From teenage mums to old ladies who sniff a lot, all of life can be found on those moulded plastic seats. All lumped together waiting for our names to be called out and most probably mispronounced. Ex-boxers, Sunday League footballers, Muslims, nuns and blokes who write blogs about sitting in hospital waiting rooms. We’re all there like a big bag of human pick ‘n’ mix. But of all the people you find in the hospital waiting room it’s the tutters and the eye rollers that get my goat. Them and their close cousins, the watch tappers and head shakers. They sit there fussing and cussing, working themselves up into an unshakeable state of agitation. “I don’t like to complain,” they lie, before going on to give the NHS the kind of verbal beating David Cameron’s speechwriters would give their MacBook Pro to have written. But do these tutters not understand what the word ‘waiting’ in waiting room means? Were they expecting to be fast-tracked through like their surname was Beckham or something? And not one of them thought to bring a book or a magazine. Or some knitting. Or an NHS doctor voodoo doll and pins. There are far better things to do with your eyes whilst you’re waiting than roll them. I use mine to people watch. Sitting opposite me last time was a man in his early 40’s with the unremarkable and instantly forgettable features of a black cab driver. I like to think he spends his Saturdays in town centre pubs, dressed in a morning suit, pretending to cry into his beer and telling any ladies who will listen that he’s just been jilted at the aisle. So far this ploy has led to 3 sympathy shags with 3 different women. Sat next to Jilted John in the waiting room was a younger woman nervously playing with the zip on her anorak. I had her down as a Secondary School history teacher who thinks her pupils don’t believe anything she says. And now her self-confidence is so low she’s starting to think that maybe some of the stuff she teaches them is a bit far fetched. Perhaps the kids are right? History is kind of unbelievable. How do we really know it happened? Those were just two of the people in the waiting room with me. For me every one of my fellow patients has their own story. So I don’t think waiting rooms are boring. It just depends how you look at them.

Competition time

Someone writing on behalf of a scheme called Celebrating UC Success emailed me today. The scheme is hoping to raise awareness and provide support and inspiration for people touched by ulcerative colitis. They’re asking for UC sufferers to contribute their story here and everyone who enters will get some sort of prize. The grand prize, it says in the email, is a 2 day trip for 2 to the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation of America’s ‘IBD Day on the Hill’ conference in Washington DC. There’s some sort of P&G tie-in, which slightly whiffs of marketing a bit, but other than that I think their intentions are genuine and good. As they say in their own words Every UC Success story is worth telling and P&G and the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation want to hear yours. Anyway they asked me if I’d share that with you. They only want 200 words. Gotta be worth a punt, hasn’t it? You might win a trip to Washington DC. You could hook up with Lav Lady. Sadly, it’s only open to US residents, so I can’t enter. But maybe the very nice lady who emailed me will offer me complimentary flights to the conference in return for this piece of precision online advertising what I’ve just gone and done for her?

Wednesday's diary on a Thursday 3.2

Now I'm off the pred I no longer have to take those chalky calcium tablets. I didn't like them. I wasn't sure whether to eat them or do algebraic equations on a blackboard with them.

Wednesday 20th February:
6.05am Loose stool, very light blood
1.20pm Loose to firmish

Medication:
6 x Mesalazine 400mg
3 x Azathioprine 50mg
3 x Ferrous Sulphate 200mg

Comments:
Over a week without the pred and it's all okay. Yup, all okay.

The Regular Ulcerative Colitis Poll One Person Voted Against, No.1 - The Results

According to official sources (NACC) the most common age of diagnosis for ulcerative colitis is between 10 and 40. And according to unofficial sources (me) diagnosis usually occurs on a Wednesday. Just after elevenses. The results of our poll would appear to reflect those findings. Okay, maybe not so much the Wednesday part. But 37% of people who voted were in their 20’s when they were diagnosed, followed by 22%, who were in their 30’s. These 2 groups made up the bulk of the voters, although interestingly more people were diagnosed in their 40’s and 50’s than those under 20. Of course these statistics are purely based on 49 people who happen to read this blog. Actually, make that 46. 3 of the voters said they don’t have UC. Enough with the numbers, my brain is beginning to unravel. What the poll does tell us though, is ulcerative colitis can pretty much strike at any age, but it tends to target those in their 20’s and 30’s. People in their prime, you could say. (No offence to the over 40’s.) Obviously there’s never a good time to get UC, but for me it seems particularly cruel to be hit with a chronic illness just when you’re trying to make your way in the world. A time when you’re just starting work or college, you’re mortgage and kid free and your only responsibility in life is making sure your best mate doesn’t get off with any munters. It’s not a great time to feel like you’re chained to the loo. Personally I feel lucky that my ulcerative colitis didn’t appear on the horizon until I was 33. I was fortunate enough to negotiate those formative years completely UC free. But no matter how old you are when you’re diagnosed with UC, it’s how you handle things after that’s important. I know one thing for sure, it made me start to act my age.

It's that al-Qaeda's fault

Some people believe stress can trigger ulcerative colitis.

No one really seems to know if this is true or not.

I’m not sure, but this is what was going on in my life in the weeks leading up to what I now know was my first flare up.

I was living in the West End of Glasgow, in a tenement flat, which I had bought 8 months earlier with my girlfriend.

Over a meal in our local Italian restaurant we broke up.

My girlfriend became my ex-girlfriend. But she was still my colleague.

Working together became intolerable, so I quit and decided to move back to London.

My boss didn’t want to lose me completely and found me an office in London’s Soho.

I arrived at Kings Cross with two bags of clothes and my laptop.

I signed the mortgage on my flat in Glasgow over to my ex. It was no longer ours, it was hers.

It’s fair to say I was drinking a lot. (I was consuming enough Guinness to drown not only my sorrows, but also those of half of London’s lonely-hearted.)

Working alone in a small office hundreds of miles from my colleagues was just downright depressing.

And I still had to deal with the ex on a daily basis. Difficult is putting it mildly.

The July bombings happened. Luckily I was already in my pokey office when the bombs went off. I spent the rest of the day in the pub.

After one too many venomous, supposedly ‘work related’ telephone conversations with the ex, I quit my job for good.

Suddenly I was freelance. With no work.

Then I started crapping blood.

I don’t wish this to sound melodramatic. I’m not looking for sympathy.

And I’m certainly not trying to lay the blame for having UC on anyone.

But this is a blog about my life with ulcerative colitis. So I think it’s relevant to discuss what happened just before my first flare up.

Did losing my girlfriend, my flat and my job, not to mention boozing for Britain, play a part in me getting ulcerative colitis? Maybe, maybe not.

I don’t suppose it really matters one way or the other now. It’s all water, and a lot of blood, under the bridge.