food allergies

Write Your Story

/ Shannon DeRose / Leave a comment

I have this notebook my sister Stephie gave me, on it it reads “Write Your Story” my whole life I’ve heard this saying write your story, make your own life, live your own life, but I have noticed lately.. People they don’t live there life’s, they just live… They just go doing nothing, but they aren’t taking breaths with purpose and they aren’t writing their own stories they are letting their stories be written for them.

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Its as if we live in a world where you can live with the way things are or we can change them or we can try to change them, we might take a long time we change them. But we are working throws it.

Its hard to write your own story, because that means you have to live with purpose and with love and you have to try so much harder than ever just to live, you have to be able to try you have to let yourself try and write it. It doesn’t mean you plan out every part of your life it means you live your life as it happens.

When you fall, you get up, you go on. You keep living you keep going on with your life. You don’t give up. You will get shot down on a weekly basis but you have to remember that you are amazing.

People will hate you but truly as long as you don’t hate you, you’ll be okay.. Life is amazing it demands to be lived. Life doesn’t happen when you sit on the side lines if you’re like me you don’t do well playing the field but you’ve found a way to be in the action without ever stepping a foot on the field. I don’t play the same games as the ones on the field but it doesn’t mean I’m not living.

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I will be the author of my own story, I will live my life. I can’t live anyone else’s because my life is my own. I take breaths and I walk and I believe in tomorrow. I also believe in today.

Because tomorrow could always be worse than today, so believe in today.

I leave you with this.. When you live life as just with going through and not really trying are you then one writing your story? Or is someone else in control? Or are you letting the way other people feel about you… Have an impact on your writing of your story?

 Write your story, no one could write it better then you…

Dear Epipens and AuviQs

/ Shannon DeRose / Leave a comment

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Dear Epipens and AuviQs

 

Thank you for being a thing. Thanks for saving my life.

  AuviQ thanks for calmly talking me through these moments in life where my heart beats fast as my hand holds you and I take a deep breath and put you in my leg to save my life. As my throat was closing slowly it opens up and I’m able to breath.

  Thank you AuviQs and Epipens for being there when I’m going into a horrifying shock that is known as anaphylactic. Thanks for saving my life all the times you have.

  Thanks for opening my air ways so I can breath and even opening them that one time when I almost waited to long to use you. Thanks for opening them up and letting me live.

  Thank you AuviQ for being small so I can take a smaller bag, and be able to fit into my pocket and save my life when need be.

  Thanks Epipen for saving me on that Friday when my friend had to use it on me. Thanks.

AuviQ thanks for that time a few months ago where you saved my life twice in one night once on the chase in my living room and again in the ride to the hospital.

 Thanks to the people who make AuviQs and Epipens available and that make them small and make them so I am able to have them. Thank you so much AuviQ Thank you so much Epipen I won’t be alive without you.


Signed ShayWeasel… Thank you guys are a life saver.

I Won’t Fail My Failing Body

/ Shannon DeRose / Leave a comment

 

Today I ate lunch and then as my disease made up its mind that this food I had taken into my body was not going to stay, I went to the restroom and vomited, a few times. I tried not to make it a big deal or anything.

When I came out of the restroom, a lady stood there just looking at me and she said “Are you bulimic?” there are a few things about this question, one if the answer was yes that is not the way to ask a stranger in the restroom. But I answered “No I have a disease called gastroparesis my stomach is paralyzed and doesn’t work the way it should.” she then went “Oh well why do you have it?” I hadn’t ever had someone ask me this follow up question before. I answered “They don’t know the reason why. It might be genetics.” She followed up with this “Maybe you just haven’t taken care of yourself.” She then left the restroom and I stood there and looked into the mirror.

My collarbones have become so much more visible, its not by choice believe me. My legs are thin, my cute round face is less round theses days, even though I have a little left of my moon face from the meds a few weeks ago. I stood there and thought.

Its not fair to me, because I have a chronic illness that people feel the need to either tell me how to heal myself or tell me that I’m not taking care of myself. If I had cancer I would be brave, and cancer is hard to face, but I don’t understand why the fact that I “just” have a chronic illness that I should just deal with it. It doesn’t seem fair. I was born with illnesses and more illnesses have attacked my strong so strong body. I’ve been through more in my life health wise than most. I’ve had crazy days and I’ve been in a places where I had to make crazy hard choices.

My body is failing me. I didn’t fail it. I didn’t make myself sick. I just am sick. I’m okay with my illnesses hurting me but I’m not okay with people telling me Its my fault. I do not have cancer, no. I have an illness that is incurable. Its lifelong, Its painful. Its horrifying sometimes. I have things that are undiagnosed. I had a doctor straight up tell me that I’ll most likely be in some pain forever, and that he was sorry. I have had surgeries not many just two, I’ve had an air tumor in my nose.. What’s that? My doctors didn’t even know.

   So no I didn’t fucking give myself theses illnesses Its not my fault. You can tell me off when I’m vomiting in the restroom, but only if you will hold my hair and then give my toilet paper so I can blow my nose and get all the vomit out it. I didn’t make myself vomit, my body is not working. My stomach has just stopped. My doctors are working to either find a med that works or a feeding tube might come into play or I might have to do some other stuff that I truly just don’t want to do. I want to go and live my life. I really want to go on that long bike ride.

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I’m strong. I’m really strong, but you see me as an attention seeker in some weird public restroom, you didn’t ask my name, you didn’t tell me you were sorry this happened to me, no you blamed me. My body is not my fault. My mind is not my fault. The things that happen to me are not my fault. I only get to choose how I react to them. And man I’ve reacted damn well… I’ve done pretty good. I choose to wake up. I choose to keep going because I don’t see the choose to stop.

   My body is failing me, but one thing’s for sure, I’m not failing my body.

 

This has been Wesday the day where I rant about whatever I please. And today I ranted… Don’t blame me for my illness, I will not fail my body.

Thanks for reading~ Shannon DeRose (Shayweasel)

The Medical World Has failed

/ Shannon DeRose / Leave a comment

This post should really bother you, if it doesn’t….

 

The medical world has failed horridly for people with chronic illnesses, they have failed us. I as someone who has multiple chronic illnesses I know. Because as the doctors talk to you like you are either stupid or like you are suppose to understand everything. I have health issues and the doctors they act like I’m suppose to put up with being in pain and being sick because they have no fucking clue how to live with chronic illness, when I go to the doctor and I say well I had one good day last week and then I say “I only threw up twice all day.” Yea thats a good day, I’m fed up with doctors treating people with chronic illnesses like its our fault, and oh they do.

in the medical world you sometimes have to wait nine weeks to nine months to a few years to get to see the only doctor who has any clue what they are doing, people are either misdiagnosed or they are called insane and sent home, or better yet put somewhere like an mental hospital when they have a physical illness that needs to be treated by a doctor who will listen.

Living with an illness is hard but personally what’s harder is hearing the words “It is all in your head” “You are already on the treatment” “the medicine I put you on is suppose to help”

My sarcastic answers to these questions are much easier for me to say then really dealing with another doctor and another treatment that didn’t work. The medical world is not helping because out of the 7000 rare diseases there are only 200 that have cures and most of the rare diseases don’t have treatments, theses diseases are unknown and so most of them are undiagnosed so you have a ten year old child whose body parts body out of place and everyone just says she is loose jointed and then they go on and act like this is fine and then when she is 15 her body hurts and other weird things keep happening but what happens when that same girl gets in a car crash and she is rushed to the ER and she is talking and all is fine but then she dies her heart burst because she has EDS and it wasn’t on any of her paperwork and she didn’t even know, because no doctor put all the pieces together, what happens then?

They die, okay lets go back a little, sometimes doctors want to put us into small little boxes when in reality some of us have multiple rare diseases, and we don’t fit into the boxes of us, well the people with EDS might be able to fit into small boxes but not health wise. The medical world needs to admit they failed the people with chronic and rare disease.

It needs to change, we don’t need to be treated like we are insane every time we walk through the door, my stomach when I throw, I just throw up like a gush of water, if you didn’t want to know that then I’m sorry, but it seems the doctors they don’t want to know either, because as soon as they come into the room, they have made up their minds, when are blood test show we are normal, maybe you aren’t doing the right blood test, maybe its you doctors, because every chronic illness person thinks its there fault, and I don’t know where doctors got this idea that everyone is making up their illnesses, but they aren’t. Maybe five people are but most of them aren’t and you need to deal with the fact that maybe you doctor have no clue what is wrong but do tell me that you know something is wrong, tell me you believe me, even if you can’t help me, just be honest with me and say you can’t because as the person with the illness, I’m not just trusting you with my illness, I’m trusting you with my life.

We have illnesses, we aren’t fakers, we are sick, so dear medical world right now you are failing the people with chronic and rare illness/diseases, and we know that we may never get better but we want some help. So please help us.

  As always I might be a spoonie for life but I just hope I’m not always in pain.

Health is amazing!!

/ Shannon DeRose / Leave a comment

when you get diagnosed with anything, you have some options, you can make up your mind that you are going to just “deal” with it. You can try and find a cure. Or you can make up your mind that you aren’t just going to “deal” with it or try and find a cure but you are going to have this disease or syndrome or allergy or other health issues and say “Welcome to my life.” It’s not that you want this illness or whatever to stay and hurt you, but you aren’t just going to “deal”

No I’m not battling any illnesses, I’m living and I’m blessed to have problems, I know I sound like a Pollyanna (overly glad person) but you can’t let something, like a health problem or something like food allergies and things that could possibly kill you.

Tomorrow I could go to the store and not purposefully touch a walnut on my way to the restroom and pass out from anaphylactic shock in the restroom and die. Thats a possibility. Its something that could happen. Life can kill you or it can make you scared to live or you can just live. You can live with anything.

WE as humans can adapt to anything, we will learn to be happy without anything. People die and we have to keep going on.

So you’ve been diagnosed with something that in time will either kill you or you have a possibility of dying from it. Think of it like this

Yesterday morning your great-grandma who was 105 years old passed away, you have to feel sad and go and lie her body in the ground. After you have lied her in the ground you have a strange choice, you can either go on or just sit and cry, so take a moment and remember what life was like with them and then get up and go on.

Walk the miles you want, do what you wanted to do before all this, but you will just have to do it differently, yes everythings going to change but its okay. Its good change. You will miss things you will cry moments of life will fall and you won’t get to be apart of it. But life can be fantastic.

Illnesses, health “problems” are just random things that happen, if you didn’t have this health thing or whatever you would have something else that would make you complain and make your life annoying. This isn’t going to be easy, I mean seriously nothing is easy. Which I personally am happy for.

It took me a long time to really understand how blessed I am to be able to understand people who have things that aren’t a bump in the road no they are a random hill thats really nice to have met along the way. I like my bumps, I like my holes, and I like the things that make my life hard because without them, I wouldn’t be Shay, I wouldn’t be okay with how much change can happen in a moment or a day or just a minute. Life changes everyday we have to deal with things.

 

I’m not right about half the stuff I say, but its what I think and what I think is what I think and no one else can think it for me, so if you don’t like it, then you don’t have to read it or hear it. I’m glad people are all different, I’m glad that we can life at stupid stuff that happens, remember that not everyone is out to get you. And that some are.

So welcome if you are newly blessed with a health issue, because this world is a beautifully artful place with randomness all over your face but it is amazing. Its just amazing.