It's my cake day, so here's my transformation, me almost dying, and then starting over from the beginning

So here's where the story starts. It's a longer one, but I think you'll like it.

I'd had an internship the summer before that I was eating out a lot either with clients or going through the drive thru for a quick bite between meetings. This was also the first year I lived off campus and was cooking for myself. I went from swimming/weight lifting 4 hours a day to 0 hours.

I started working out everyday and eating healthier. My favorite thing to do was to add as many veggies as I could to my everyday meals. My breakfast went from a fried egg and pepper jack cheese on toast, to a fried egg with red peppers, yellow peppers, poblano peppers, and spinach on toast with pepper jack cheese.

I also controlled my portions. Instead of eating an entire chicken breast for dinner every night with sides, I ate a third of one with my sides. I learned that I don't need to eat until I'm stuffed every meal. Stomach problems went away - I felt better

Here I wanted to take shoulder and back muscle progression pictures.

My sides slimmed down and I started getting curves. I started to become happy with my progress.

At this point I'd been working out so long that I became distressed if I didn't go. It was apart of my every day schedule and it was wonderful.

Getting stronger everyday

(If you aren’t using the app you’ll need to click the blue button on this picture to view the rest of the story) Feeling really good about myself. But I started getting sick again. I thought I just needed to eat even better and work out more. I figured my stomach problems would go away in no time.

(If you aren’t using the app you’ll need to click the blue button on this picture to view the rest of the story) Here I'm starting to get abs and stomach muscles. I'd never been happier with my body in my entire life. I'd worked so hard for this. My stomach problems started to get worse. I began experiencing a lot of pain in my abdominal region, too. I decided it wasn’t worth bothering anyone about - it’d get better on its own.

Here I am the day things went south. I'd been in pain that morning and my stomach had been worse than ever before. I had this awful pressure on my stomach and I was extremely irritable. I play paintball and had to remove my pod pack from around my waist because it caused me too much pain to wear it. But this tournament was for a friend in the paintball community that had committed suicide just a month earlier, so I went and played despite whatever was going on. Everything in my body told me not to go. I was vomiting on the side of the field and spent most of the event curled up in a canvas chair under a tent.

3 days later. The day after the tournament I had flu symptoms. Body aches, throbbing headache, stuffy head and shivers - the whole 9 yards. I went to a walk in clinic and they had me give them stool samples after they determined I didn't have the flu and I'd told them about my ongoing randomly occurring upset stomach problems. They said I probably had a virus or a bug in my system. If It wasn't that, it was something much more serious. They called back 2 days later and said I had neither, and that they would try to get me in touch with a local Gastroenterologist. Meanwhile, my upset stomach made a turn for the worse and started containing blood. I woke up the morning of this picture and couldn't open my eyes because I was in so much pain. I had a fever of 105 degrees and was passing mostly blood at this point. The gastroenterologist called me and said they'd take me in a day or two. I started crying and told them that I don't think I'd make it through the night if they didn't take me now. I shocked myself when I'd said that but something deep inside said that It might not be far off from the truth. I'm a very "rub some dirt in it" type of person and will usually downplay the pain I'm in. But that sentence came out of me like word vomit. I was in excruciating pain every second of that morning. There was no "finding a comfy side" or "sleeping it off". Every. Single. Second. Was searing pain. The doctor decided to see me right away. Here I am in the hospital, my body swelling, after the doctor realized something was very wrong and had me sent there. Something about passing globs of blood didn't seem right to him, I guess. He said it was a good thing they got me in that day.

Here I am with my first IV and my first time in a hospital.

They ran several tests on my and did an endoscope and a partial colonoscopy. My stomach and large intestine were a blood bath. The next day they encouraged me to walk. I was so weak that I walked 200 feet and had to stop because I was out of breath and sweating through my gown. My mom had to help me back to my bed.

I slept most of the days. I was woken up every hour of the night to be given medications or have blood drawn. I had CAT scans and every other scan done in the book. My symptoms aligned with pancreatic cancer. Nobody has ever survived pancreatic cancer as far as I know. I wondered if I was going to die. I had a few of these symptoms for the last 2 years, although they weren't a hundredth as extreme as they were now. I couldn't help that wonder, if i did have cancer, if I had made it worse by trying to rub some dirt in it and just ignore it. What if it had been stage 1, but now it was stage 4? I asked my long term boyfriend what we would do if I was going to die. He said I’d quit school, he’d quit his job, and we would travel the world. I cried a lot. I was so depressed. None of my friends came to see me. Only my parents and my boyfriend visited me. He was wonderful, he stayed with me, painted my toe nails, and even snuck in a Culver's milkshake for me. He told me he was scared out of his mind, but I'll never be able to thank him enough for staying strong for me. My parents were going through a nasty divorce but I was happy to see them come together for me in this time.

I eventually got out of the hospital. I was starting grad school and they wanted to make sure I was there for the first day. I was weak, it took me 40 min to make a 15 min walk to my first class. This picture was a few weeks later. I had lost a ton of weight and I had lost all of my muscle progress... but I was even happier because I'd slimmed down. I found out that my intestines had been swelling and pressing against the walls of my body and other organs. Also, my small intestines and large intestine had been bleeding. I didn't know why, but hell I was happy I was even thinner. Body image issues are a fucked up thing.

More testing done. My doctor said I might have Disease A, or Disease B. He said I'd better pray that I have A and not B. I'm squeamish about needles and was freaked out they'd put the IV in my wrist instead of hand.

I'm fucked up on anesthesia but here I am trying to Snapchat and be goofy nonetheless.

(If you aren’t using the app you’ll need to click the blue button on this picture to view the rest of the story) My doctor called me in a week after my further testing and told me me my diagnosis. I had Disease B. I was diagnosed with Crohn's disease Nov. of this last year and I'd have it the rest of my life. I was in shock. My immune system was attacking my intestines. It was trying to kill them. There wasn't a cure, only methods and medications to make it easier. What did this mean for me? I sat in his office speechless as he wrote me what seemed like 100 prescriptions. I'd start my ritual of taking 31 pills a day that week.

(If you aren’t using the app you’ll need to click the blue button on this picture to view the rest of the story) Most days I spent laying in bed in pain. The meds that helped with the disease would take 3 months to start working. I had no energy. I would lay in bed and sleep all day until I went to class, and then go back to bed. My crushing depression didn't help. I'd have this for the rest of my life and there wasn't anything I could do. I found out that some people get surgery to remove the affected part of their intestines, but then the disease just returns to the part where the organ was reattached. Such a bleak disease. I was barely hanging on to my graduate program. I'm getting my Master's of Science in Information and Communication Sciences aka, lots of technology. Reading engineering and tech textbooks is already dry, and add a debilitating auto immune disease in the mix that saps your energy and you end up not doing the million hours of reading required each week. I asked myself "Why me? Why did this have to happen to me? Why not someone else?" More often than I'm proud to admit.

I started to work out again but it took a lot out of me. The doctor warned me that all the steroids I was taking would cause me to gain a ton of weight. I was terrified of losing the body that I finally loved so much. But that was beyond my control.

And here I am as of last week (February 2018). I'm the heaviest I've ever been, and back to square one. Although I'm ashamed of how I look and embarrassed, I'm not angry anymore.

This was unavoidable and that's okay. It's a process and I'll get back to loving my body again someday.

I can't be angry. I knew this would happen and I survived nearly dying. Hell, I was on the field playing paintball days before I went down. I'm still pursuing my master's degree and I've decided to get into Information Security. I'm tough as hell. I've still got a ways to go and I'm doing much better. I'm still working out every day and eating healthy. I still get exhausted easily, especially now that I've recently stopped taking the steroids. People have made comments about my size and the weight I've put on, but they don't know what I've gone through. I hope they don't have to. I want to bring awareness to this disease (somebody pls find a cure, by the way). I want someone to read this who may think they can handle something going downhill with their health: GET HELP. Don't wait. Please, your body and health are more important than your pride or ego. Take care of yourself physically and emotionally.

Hopefully by my next cake day I'll be doing even better. This picture was taken after I'd made my New Years resolution: I will be more positive, honest with myself, and more vulnerable. Here I am, trying to do all three. Thanks for reading, Imgurians.

Also, I can't believe I have to say this, but please do not send unsolicited dick pics. I don't want to see it, and it's sexual harassment. Thanks.
Dog tax on my profile because I committed a heinous crime and forgot to add her https://imgur.com/gallery/64knX

EDIT: I'd be more than happy to answer any questions you have. I've been flooded with support from healthy people and Crohn's sufferers. I'm very new to this but I can still answer questions or concerns you might have. It's really nice to know there's such a supportive Crohn's community here on Imgur. It's nice to not feel alone.

EDIT: so many people have asked so I'll just put it here
Instagram: the_empress_kaitlin

EDIT: most viral and number one on the front page. I expected to be downvoted into oblivion. Thank you so much. I've been able to get in touch with so many Crohn's and Colitis sufferers. I've received messages of people thanking me to motivate them from getting to the gym to making a doctor appointment. This has been fantastic and I'm so happy people enjoyed my story. 2017 was the hardest year of my life for a trillion of reasons, but I've learned a lot.