One night, at home, in bed, I insisted on being left alone. I had an out-of-body expe­ri­ence and real­ized that I was going to die. I was in bed, yet my spirit had sunk below the bed through the floor of the house and was look­ing up towards my body. The real­iza­tion of immi­nent death took over and I decided that I was not going to let this dis­ease take my life! A flush of energy took over my body and, even though I was still very sick, I knew I was going to be OK. I had come to the real­iza­tion that I had to be accept­ing the hos­pi­tal as the only thing I could do now.

Ear­lier, I had booked into an alter­na­tive bowel treat­ment cen­ter, and tried many treat­ments. That clinic was just learn­ing about oxy­gen ther­apy, which I did, along with colonics, wheat grass juice, and many other treat­ments. Hav­ing never taken any steroids or med­ica­tion for my Crohns’ I had done these kinds of treat­ment off and on for years. This time it was dif­fer­ent. There was no response and I was deteriorating.

It was time for try­ing some­thing dras­tic. Although scared about the idea of surgery, real­is­ti­cally this was the only option left. I had lost all con­trol over my bow­els and vom­ited any­thing by mouth.

For­tu­nately, by the time I was this sick, I was in Toronto, and Toronto is the home of Mount Sinai Hos­pi­tal which is con­sid­ered the best one in Canada for bowel prob­lems. At 82 lbs, hav­ing lost most of my vision due to dehy­dra­tion, and not being able to stand, I con­sented to going to the hos­pi­tal. My sis­ter got a cab and off we went. When we got there my hemo­glo­bin was so low from bleed­ing that they could not under­stand why I had not died. In my opin­ion, the oxy­gen ther­apy, and my ear­lier deci­sion to not die was what was keep­ing me alive.

Once in the hos­pi­tal, on some steroids, and TPN, my mind started to come back and I began to become aware of my sur­round­ings again. Being in the hos­pi­tal was quite an expe­ri­ence for me because I had only been in a hos­pi­tal once or twice in my life for a quick visit. I was in shock. Mount Sinai Hos­pi­tal has a whole wing ded­i­cated to bowel surgery, the biggest in Canada. And the sad­dest place I had ever been.

Most hos­pi­tal stays for peo­ple are a few days, maybe a week. Well, not here. Here the stays are more likely a few months, maybe a year, and the aver­age age was under 30. Most of you with an ostomy know what I’m talk­ing about. The despair that one gets when they are admit­ted to hos­pi­tal with no idea of when they will be able to go home, and it looks like it will be months, is ter­ri­ble. I was defi­antly not stay­ing; I would be out of here next week!

Well… the weeks turned into months and I did not get to go home. But, after a while, I insisted on being trans­ferred to a hos­pi­tal closer to my family.

Love, Sheri

[Editor’s note: Sheri’s writ­ings are spread out over time so they’re not strictly a follow-on from the pre­vi­ous writ­ing. I’m sure you will find them most inter­est­ing and, hope­fully, find her expe­ri­ences and pos­i­tive mes­sages help­ful. Below are links to Sheri’s per­sonal jour­ney expe­ri­ence writ­ings and thoughts. You can also access these links from the side menu, or the “About Me” menu on the top-right of the page. ]

• About Me — My “Pull Through” Jour­ney — Introductions
• Con­trol­ling Crohn’s Dis­ease? Anorexia worked! Until it didn’t.
• [Cur­rent Page] Accept­ing the Hos­pi­tal ~ No other choice left.
• Trans­fer­ring Closer to Home
• Yes­ter­day I Cried ~ With an agenda.
• It’s OK to Cry
• My Pre­scrip­tion Drug Addic­tion — Good or Bad?
• Leav­ing the Poor Me Stage
• My Jour­ney of Pulling Through — Final Thoughts