How I Fell in Love With Life After Getting Sick At 14

You’ve heard the story. Read it in a book, seen it in a movie, or watched a whole TV series about it. The one where someone gets diagnosed with some sort of illness and starts living life to the fullest. They start crossing things off their bucket list, loving harder, and appreciating the little things. That cliche is exactly what happened to me.

I got sick when I was 14, diagnosed with an autoimmune disease at 15, and now I’m 19 and I have learned, grown, and fallen head over heels in love with life since then.

This is something I have talked about in other blog posts and in short bits across many social media posts. I share little lessons I have learned and talk about how much I love living- my TikTok bio has been “the cliche where the sick girl falls in love with life” for over a year now. I share all of this both for people who are also sick to help them find a way back to a life they love, but also for healthy people to understand chronic illness a little better and also to use my sick lessons in their own life.

The question I get the most though is the “how”. I have learned so much about myself and life from being sick, but I haven’t shared a lot about how exactly this happened.

So today I am going to tell you a few stories. These are moments from my life that taught me something and inspired me to grow, and I want to tell you about them.

Learning to be Comfortable Being Uncomfortable

I was in a pretty much constant state of pain from January 2018 onwards, but I also had so many good times.

In the spring of my senior year, I started taking road trips throughout the southwest. After waking up on the rock digging through my sleeping pad all night long and crawling out of the tent to make coffee beside a cliff while watching the sunrise over the desert with one of my favorite humans, I can’t imagine being upset over waking up with a crick in my neck.

I don’t remember exactly when, but at some point, I realized that when I’m old and grey, I won’t remember being hot or cold, tired or in pain, embarrassed, or any of life’s other discomforts. The happy, beautiful memories- those are the ones I will hold onto.

I won’t remember quite how exhausted I was or how bad my stomach hurt, but I think I will remember riding a tandem bike with my best friend, chasing the rising sun on the empty streets of Boulder, trying to get to the breakfast place, Snooze, as soon as it opened after staying up all night.

For me, realizing that discomfort is temporary was the first step to learning how to genuinely enjoy moments, even in pain and discomfort.

Not being afraid of discomfort has let me open myself up to the most incredible opportunities. I jump in the water knowing full well I will be wet and cold after because I also know how hard I will laugh and how happy I will be to have that sweet memory later on. I sleep on the ground because waking up in a place so beautiful it takes your breath away will always be worth it. I climb mountains, wake up for the sunrise, and stargaze because I know the view will be worth every ounce of pain and discomfort.

Some Things Are Just Worth the Pain

There is absolutely a balance between pushing through for a good time and saying no to listen to your body, and with time I’ve learned this. But I also learned that some things, some people, and some experiences are just worth the pain.

Trying to keep up with teenagers while I was living with chronic illness was one of the hardest things I have ever done, especially during the phase when I refused to tell anyone I was sick or change my life in any way. I didn’t want to miss out on anything or be the “lame” one to suggest we take it easy and not do something exhausting and objectively stupid. Try suggesting a chill, early night to a room full of 16 year olds already deep in their plan to take a night hike, jump into the creek, and pierce someone’s ears, all before we watch the sunrise on some roof, of course.

I was pushing myself way too hard out of fear of being judged or missing out. I would not recommend this phase. But, in doing this I discovered that some things are just worth the pain and others are not.

Some nights are so fun and full of laughter, that they are worth every bit of pain the next day. But there have also been times I rallied, forced myself to go depsite feeling like garbage, then had that feeling of “crap I don’t want to be here” the second I walked in.

As much as I love road trips, they hurt. Sleeping on the ground, driving for too long, doing a lot in a short time, and not eating the best are pretty much a guarantee for a flare-up. After my spring road trip, I had one of the worst flare-ups I’ve ever had. Yet, right now I’m planning this year’s spring break road trip with even more time on the road and more distance to cover. Because for me, road trips will always be worth it.

Autoimmune diseases are lifelong, so I’m in for a life of flare-ups and bedridden days anyways. Maybe it’s a control thing or a way of saying “screw you” to my illness, but the flare-ups after a trip or just doing something mind-blowingly cool are always more bearable than the surprise, random flare-ups. Partly because I know the reason why, but mostly because the good memories pop into my head and make me smile.

Beautiful Moments are Everywhere

One summer night, when I was probably 16, my friends and I were having a sleepover at my friend’s house- a little house tucked into the mountains in Boulder. It was late and we decided we wanted to see the stars. So with bare feet and the light from our phone flashlights, we out a ladder from this pile of crap in the garage and dragged it up this big hill all the way around the house. It was a short ladder, so we set it next to my friend’s parents’ window where the roof was the shortest. The ladder was still about 4 feet lower than the roof and no one could stop laughing so getting up was not easy. But we did it somehow. We laid on the roof for a long while, just staring at the stars and talking. It was beautiful (getting down was not).

That moment was right at our fingertips, or you know, right above our heads. Even though it wasn’t necessarily easy to make happen. That one taught me that beautiful moments are EVERYWHERE and that it is in my power to create them, even if I have to work for it a little.

Sometime during my senior year, before I started road-tripping and the weather was still cold, I was dreaming about adventure so I started watching the sunset. It became a night routine for me to get in my car, drive to a lookout, and watch the sunset.

It was so easy and nice that it became my favorite part of the day. I noticed myself thinking about my sunset adventures throughout the day, so I rolled with that and started taking little adventures in the daytime too. I started taking drives, doing my homework in pretty spots outside, and taking walks just to be outside. That’s when I realized that adventure is everywhere and it doesn’t require any money or planning, just a desire to do it. Before I knew it, there was a constant flow of adventure in my life.

Life Really Isn’t That Serious

Before getting sick, I was known for my physical strength. I was on a competitive rock climbing team and once won a water bottle when the marines came to my high school and I did 23 pulls ups. Going from that to being chronically ill was heartbreaking, to say the least. I stayed on that climbing team until my junior year though. Even on my worst days- trying to complete a workout in my sick body- there were still moments of laughing so hard with my friends that I forgot about the pain for a moment. Those days taught me that life really isn’t that serious.

There is No One Right Way to Live

Pre-pandemic, the idea of switching to online school was always on the back of my mind but I never thought I would actually go through with it. It wasn’t a welcomed topic of conversation with my parents, and I was sort of too scared of the “homeschooled kid” stereotypes anyways.

But then a pandemic shut down the world and put every kid in online school, so I got to try it out without the fear of judgment or even having to make the decision on my own.

So I spent my last year or so of high school in online school, which sounds really sad but for me, that’s when I got my life back.

For the first time since diagnosis, I was able to drop the pressure of trying to keep up with kids my age. I got to live slowly and move through my day at an attainable pace. I was able to listen to my body and finally got control of my symptoms. I had energy more energy for the things that make me happy since I wasn’t wasting all of my energy at school. I started making art and realized how much I love to create, which healed the heartbreak of losing my physical strength.

Where There’s a Will, There’s a Way

I got sick before my life really began. All the things that come as normal to a teenager like going to school full time, playing a sport, working, hanging out with friends, being able to stay up late, and managing it all at once- all of that suddenly got a whole lot harder for me.

Suddenly, I had to work hard to do these normal things. Adding anything extra on my plate or chasing my dreams seemed out of the question. For anything I wanted to do, I had to want it bad enough to accept extra pain or get creative with accommodations and adjustments for myself to make it happen.

Thank you:)

I really love this life, and sharing all the things I have learned since getting sick makes me so happy and I really hope it helps or inspires you in one way or another.