Columns

I used to scoff at the idea of saving money for retirement. It didn’t seem feasible to me to try to plan decades into the future. I accepted long ago that I wouldn’t live past 40, so why save money for a distant future if it was unlikely I…

If I were a doctor, I would say hello and ask a couple questions about the individual first. That way, they would feel like they’re a person, I’m a person, and we are two people who can talk about health. I would not act like the doctor I spoke to…

As a person with cystic fibrosis, I’ve formed close-knit relationships with care providers in multiple disciplines. Before my double-lung transplant three years ago, I was hospitalized frequently. I would be hospitalized for a couple weeks, out for a few, and then back in again. So the cycle went. My…

“Is this what I’m going to do forever?” I asked my dad. We were waiting outside a lab that hadn’t received the necessary fax to draw my blood, even though we had called and confirmed with my doctor’s office hours before. I had emailed my primary doctor earlier in the…

When I was in high school, an informational book about cystic fibrosis made its way to me. As I read through it, I found a section on mental health. It stated something along the lines of, “Although CF carries a lot of emotional baggage, depression is not a common comorbidity.”…

To the doctors who didn’t listen to me: You were wrong. I remember the time I arrived in the ER six years ago, a place I mostly refuse to go, and you said, “Go home. You have vertigo.” You were a female, which I thought would work in my favor.

I remember what it felt like to get fired for being sick: that pit in the middle of my belly that caused my mouth to go dry, my voice to shake, and my face to flush with shame. Sitting around a table with multiple bosses, I couldn’t believe what I…

I should’ve died years ago, but I’m too damn competitive. A doctor said I’d cross my high school graduation stage in a wheelchair, toting supplemental oxygen. “Challenge accepted,” I thought. Weeks later, I walked with my head held high and unobstructed by oxygen tubing. When I lost my mind due…

In my last column, I addressed feelings I had about being unable to perform at the same professional caliber as my peers. One of the ways I have mentally adapted is realizing this: The “five-year plan” wasn’t created for the chronically ill. This “five-year” concept, a popular long-term…

A pandemic meets a life-changing medication. It sounds like the beginning of a modern love story. Last year, a film came out about two teenagers with CF who fall in love. If you’ve been even tangentially near the CF community, you’re probably familiar with it. To reclaim…