Here’s a new fact for you to know about me: New Year’s is my favorite holiday season. To me, it starts on Boxing Day, which is officially recognized on the day after Christmas, and ends when work begins again in the new year. In my memory, all New Year’s Eve…
Advocacy and Abnormality
— Kristin Entler
Kristin Entler was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis at 6 months old, and first came out as LGBT+ several years after her diabetes diagnosis at 12 years old. She currently serves as poetry editor for NELLE, as access coordinator for Open Mouth Literary Center, and lives with her service-dog, Azzie, whose name is short for the Greek god of medicine. Entler can be found on most social media platforms @findmycure. She hopes her column “Advocacy and Abnormality” is a space for inclusion and solidarity for anyone living in a body that is often seen or treated as different.
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The University of Alabama hospital wing that houses my cystic fibrosis (CF) clinic always reminds me of an airport. The main hallway has signs overhead that direct everyone toward different “terminals,” and by 10 a.m., the place is always swarming with people. Patients have myriad chronic illnesses, some apparent,…
In elementary school, the holiday season was always a time of illness. With cold and flu season being driven, in large part, by Thanksgiving travels and family gatherings, it was inevitable that kids would return to school with whatever respiratory bug some uncle flew into Alabama from North Carolina,…
Imagine this: As an established patient with lifelong illnesses, you walk into any pharmacy, slide an access pass, and walk out with your prescription drug refills in less than five minutes. It didn’t require you to phone in your prescription. And you didn’t have to talk to anyone, unless you…
Last week, I went to my first indoor, in-person event since January 2020. Honestly, I’d spent a majority of the time since the COVID-19 pandemic began thinking that my days of attending indoor events were behind me. The fact of the matter is that the more people go unmasked…
“I want to get a Popsicle from the ice cream truck!” M’s nutmeg eyes lit up when I asked her what she wanted to do. She was my best friend at the time, and my dad had brought us to the arts and crafts fair, where my mom had a…
“Want to go for a ride in the car?” I ask my Australian shepherd and poodle mix, Azzie. It’s been a few months since I last trimmed his fur, so it’s grown out to the length that makes him look like a fuzzy Muppet. He wags his tail and pants…
On the most recent episode of CBS News’ “60 Minutes,” President Joe Biden declared the pandemic over. I wish I could be writing with champagne in hand and firecrackers crackling at a party that, yes, an endless future of indoor gatherings is in sight. But that image of…
Every day for countless years now, my routine has been the same. I take a handful of meds with breakfast and dinner, the cocktail of which ebbs and flows, and digestive enzymes with all of my meals. Like most people with a lifetime of chronic illness under their belt,…
“A bat!” my mom announces to my dad and me. I look up at where she’s pointing to see, yes, a winged mammal swooping and diving and cutting back with deadly precision. I’m glad that something is eating the determined mosquitoes I’m fending off with two citronella candles and what…
It’s 2012 and I’m in my second year of community college. My hair is down to my shoulders and I carry a bottle of hand sanitizer attached to my backpack, which gets used by more people in my classes than I anticipated, but I’m happy to share. After all, fewer…
Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, I’ve never met my current pulmonary care provider in person, and I keep putting off my face-to-face appointment. I moved from Alabama to Arkansas for graduate school in the summer of 2020. It was the first time I lived outside my home state. I’d…
If I’m being completely honest — and when I started this column, that was one of my initial promises and intentions — I’ve been struggling lately. But complete honesty doesn’t automatically equal complete transparency, and grief is an emotion so wholly personal and raw I still don’t feel…
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