Category: Uncategorised

Up at 5am on Monday in the middle of Winter,
Snoozed for five minutes, seemed like two seconds, hoped it would go on forever,
Threw off the blanket and sat up rather quickly,
Felt the full force of Winter’s fury, fuck going to work I’m chucking a sickie.
But I pushed on, ignoring the sweet call of the mattress,
He who has the gold ain’t scared of no cold, gotta make sacrifices on the way to greatness,
Stood up and stretched, gathered my work wear before heading for the showers.
Six minutes steaming, didn’t want it to end, carrying on a conversation in my head,
Stepped out at the count of three, cold chills attacked, almost had me doing jumping jacks.
Got dressed up, ready to roll, had a quick breakfast before heading out the door,
No time to feast when you’re living on the fast lane,
Time is short, gotta keep my mind on the game,
This will be a long day, the week’s barely started,
Hopped into the car and gunned it, still too early to deal with traffic.

Parked the car at the library, five minute walk to the station followed,
Body no longer feels hollow, total opposite to my eyes,
These peepers have yet to energize,
Walked through the back of the mighty shopping mall,
Revamped a few times through the years though vandals did a number on the walls,
This wide open space still devoid of crowds, like a mass exodus had gone down,
A few short hours will bring change, shoppers and junkies will soon populate this place,
Benches remain unoccupied, covered in bird shit, the result of sitting directly beneath trees,
A mob of galahs got their party mode on whooping and hollering as they please,
Caterwauling up the branches like hyperactive kids on Red Bull,
Passed through the trees and felt the brunt of their noise in full,
Mocking and taunting, perhaps? At the human weaklings that can’t handle the early morning,
‘Gotta bundle up in the cold and rain? How’d they place themselves atop the food chain?’
Paid those feathered fools no mind, I’m just trying to stay awake,
Taking comfort in the fact that I won’t have to finish late.
Left those birds behind and kept on moving,
Train must be here soon, got no time for goofing,
Broke into a powerwalk, became a half-walk half-run,
The cold air like acid as it scraped against my lungs,
Made it to the train station in time with five minutes to spare,
Already a few souls on my platform, equally zombified with blank stares,
Listening to this tune by 2Pac on my ipod, remix of an old song,
Inferior to the original, still I nod my head along,
The train arrives, chugging lazily before coming to a halt,
The driver’s face said it all, he’d rather be curled up in bed like a ball.

Sat on the top level of a middle carriage, two others there to keep me company,
Early starts and winter mornings are a toxic marriage, I guess I’ll just think about the money,
Still dark outside, the air at North Pole levels,
Turning up my earphones until it’s at dangerous decibels,
The train stops at my destination, time to spring into action,
Seven hours of hard grind just to bring home the bacon.
Now the sun’s rising, the dark of night fades to an early morning purple,
Shivering through my coat and sweater, man I hate this weather.
Approaching my building now, let’s put on a happy face,
I step in and pass through reception, at least there’s heating in this place.

Back into normal routine, so glad to be here,
Free at last, but not so fast, still taking pills for the next few years,
Meditating, contemplating, reviewing the situation like Fagin,
A few hits, some misses, better think it out again,
I done come a long way and now things are looking up,
Gone through the conveyor belt but still no finished product,
Never gonna give up, I’m on the way out,
Obstacles be damned, gonna see this battle out.

3/11/2018

All Souls Day rolled around on the first Saturday of November, a day on the Christian calendar during which worshippers would take time to remember their deceased relatives. For my family it meant going to mass at the cemetery before sitting at the resting place of my late grandmother, waiting for a priest to bless her headstone. It would be the longest amount of time I’d spend away from home since the road trip a few months ago.
Sounds all well and good but there was a catch – there was nary a restroom in sight at this place. Yes, I felt healthy again and could go out and about with confidence but attending an event that would last for most of the day with no visible restrooms? Yeah, innocuous as it might have seemed it was going to be a challenge of sorts for yours truly and I’ll admit that the anxiety that came with the fear of another flare-up and a possible ‘accident’ instantly reared its ugly head, clinging onto me for the better part of the morning like a creepy ex-partner that refused to accept the fact that the relationship had crashed and burned like the Hindenburg

Fortunately, the angry, profane drill sergeant within who had previously pushed me towards resuming ‘normal life’ intervened and gave me the mental bollocking that I sorely needed at the time.

Boy, you kicked Colitis’ ass like a BOSS!!! You haven’t had any relapses or accidents, all this negativity is all in your fucking head!!! Stop thinking like a fucking weakling and get out there!! You’re a motherfucking BEAST!!!!!  

It wasn’t exactly John Hartigan from the film Sin City willing himself to soldier on in order to save Nancy Callaghan from the yellow bastard despite facing certain death from the noose around his neck but it was the type of pep talk that I needed to pull myself together. The anxiety might have been there but that didn’t mean I had to let it overrun and beat me down and once the drill sergeant had his say I was back to my normal self.

Anyway, I woke up on the morning of All Souls Day and had breakfast with my parents before returning to my room to engage in a bit of reading, an activity that I credit for helping me during my recovery and which I still engage in to this day to ward off stress and anxiety. It felt good to open up a book and embark on a half-hour adventure in my mind following a nice morning meal and it helped to ease some of the nerves that, at the time, were still swimming through my mind like Michael Phelps on steroids.
Just a metaphor, folks, not accusing him of anything!
I kept the blinds rolled up and the window open, allowing the spring air and sun to seep through. Man that felt so good! The book I was reading was set in a small town in the Arizona desert so I felt like some sort free-spirited adventure, riding on horseback across that desert without a care in the world as the wind blew through my hair. It was only me and the elements, my trusty steed and various rocks and cacti that framed the unsealed road under the blue sky that was tinted a slight pink from the earthy dust.

But before I knew it, half an hour passed.

Having rested sufficiently, and following the foul-mouthed motivational speech from my inner drill sergeant, I gathered my clothes for the day before heading to the bathroom to shower and dress.

Alright, let’s do this.

Later during the day, following a one-hour service, my family and I camped around the resting place of my late grandmother, waiting for one of the many priests that led the service to make their way towards us to pray for her soul. My grandmother’s resting place was overlooked by a line of trees that blocked off a steel fence that separated the cemetery from a residential area, providing some shelter from the sun. The only seating available was a small stone wall that the line of trees was situated on, surrounded by some flowers that framed a pebble stream. Sitting atop that wall for a long period of time was a literal pain in the backside. Luckily I had trained myself a long time ago to be able to stand for long periods of time.
My grandmother’s resting place was one of many spread out through a vast green field and as I gazed throughout the area I had noticed that some families had set up picnic spreads and some even erected small tents and covers to ward off the sun.
A priest arrived after just a little over half an hour of waiting and we quickly said a prayer for my late grandmother before he blessed her headstone. My parents and I then bade my aunt and uncle good bye before driving out of the cemetery and heading to the nearest grocery store for some afternoon shopping before driving back home.

Mission accomplished without incident. You were sweating bullets for nothing again!

I guess I was. That inner voice wasn’t done chastising me just yet.

Stop selling yourself short, Boy! You’ve proven time and time again that you can handle all the shit that life throws at you yet you still refuse to believe in yourself. What the fuck kind of bitch-ass shit is that!?

Color me humbled, that foul-mouthed son of a gun was totally in the right.

If there’s anything that this particular day had taught me it was that while I had all but won the physical battle (I won’t call it a true victory until the day I am well enough to cease medical treatment but I am well on my way), the mental battle continued. Truthfully, and not to sound clichéd, this turned out to be the hardest part. I could take all the medication in the world and live as cleanly as possible but I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t have horrible thoughts and paranoid feelings that one day I’d relapse badly, that my body will find a way to reject the treatment and that the disease would undergo some form of deadly metamorphosis.
You’re probably thinking, “Just don’t think about it” and “think positively” and believe me, I tell myself that over and over again whenever I find myself caught in that funk and while I’m always able to snap out of it, some days are harder than others.

I’ve suffered from bouts of depression and anxiety since I was young. It’s never crippled me to the point where I’ve become a danger to myself and others and I have ways of keeping them at bay, but there have definitely been days where I found myself not giving a fuck about anything anymore and others where I cared too much about stupid shit that won’t matter in the long term or fearing the worst about everything. Did either one of those fuckers spring up during the height of my colitis war? Damn straight it did! You bet your last dime that I was depressed over the next few days after receiving my diagnosis and there were definitely times where I’d silently freak out over whether or not I’d ever be ‘normal’ again, scaring myself stupid whenever I felt the slightest hint of pain or discomfort.
But I am fortunate to have good people in my life, both near and far, to keep me in check and remind me that it wasn’t all bad. I also had my coping methods that included, but were not limited to, reading, writing, music, working out (though that was limited during the thick of my recovery) and just standing or sitting outside staring at the sky, whether it was watching the puffy white clouds floating through the endless blue like cotton balls during the daytime or watching ghostly apparitions hovering past the moon in the hypnotic noir at night.
Staring at the sky is quite a soothing, meditative experience. Go ahead, step outside now and try it out for the next ten minutes. It’ll be time well spent.
All up, they all helped to pull me out of the abyss and back into the light, as well as remind me that I was a true fighter, possessed more strength than I thought and that I never folded.    

I’ll never fold.

I got through that day in one piece without any problems. I am still on the right track. I just have to keep on fighting.

Dear Kid,

What’s the matter? Why the tears in your eyes?
you’re ten years old in ‘95, what a time to be alive,
homework completed, the wretched specter of school abated,
you’ve earned a brief parole period you should be excited.
Mom’s in the kitchen preparing dinner, smells like good food,
she can’t hear your boo-hoos, your room’s locked, the TV’s blaring in the living room,
your parents look out for you, you have a stable home life, too,
you ain’t suffering at all so why do tears flow like Niagara Falls?

So you’ve been pondering the concept of time, of life and death,
ventured into the deep end, wound up feeling overwhelmed,
how your precocious mind wandered this way remains a mystery,
but as long as you’re here you may as well accept some harsh realities,
none of us will get out alive, it’s just a fact of life,
the hardiest individuals will fall, so will the strongest empires,

Life’s so good for you now, bet you want it to go on forever,
it don’t work like that, Kid, you’ll grow older but hopefully, wiser,
first comes high school and university, then out in the world to build your legacy,
being an adult sucks, it’s a lesson that you’ll learn soon enough.
You young ones can’t comprehend what life’s like on the other end,
it ain’t like a video game or cartoon show, no reset button or channel change when you’re dealt a low blow,
some mistakes could be life-altering, some straight-up deadly,
literally and figuratively, the world can be kinda scary,
grown-ups are free to do what they want? Who sold you that lie!?
school and rules are nothing compared to real life,
you, too, will run the gauntlet that’ll test your spirit and guile, not to mention your will to survive.

Death is inevitable, no one is spared, you already know it,
it’s difficult to accept but you’re just a kid, why even think about it?
you have many years ahead, further challenges to be met, so go and dry your tears,
you may not know it yet but you are in the midst of your golden years,
you can’t predict the future and the past is done, focus on the here and now,
do your best in school and keep your room tidy, respect your elders, that’s your responsibility,
be good to people, even if some won’t reciprocate, two wrongs won’t make a right,
there’s enough jerks in this world, don’t join the herd, guaranteed you’ll sleep well at night.

You’re only young once, might as well do it in style,
it’s ok to misbehave once in a while, to run riot and go buck wild,
go outside and play, practice those fighting moves you saw in video games,
act the fool with your friends until your mother angrily calls your name,
don’t take these years for granted, make sure you can look back misty-eyed on ‘em,
learn to count your blessings, in the end you’re one of the lucky ones.

There you have it, Kid, keep your head up and smile,
you’re doing just fine, for now appreciate the joys of being a child,
get yourself cleaned up, Pops will be home soon,
the sun’s going down to make way for the night moon,
enjoy dinner with the family, cherish moments such as these,
bonds forged with the right people and memories will never die, extending beyond even the sands of time.

Another morning walk, great way to start the weekend,
the masses still asleep, chaos hasn’t started yet,
the air still crisp with the smell of morning dew,
no cars passing through, I can still breathe without the urge to puke,
the sun’s come up but the morning chill persisted,
made sure to bundle up, to hell with feeling sick and bedridden,
alone with my thoughts, listening to a tune by TQ,
reviewing the week that was, now in my rear-view,
a few odd niggles perhaps, but who the heck is counting?
No point getting hung up on what won’t matter in the long run,
life wasn’t meant to be spent stuck in quicksand.

Drifted away from the park, passed by my old school,
where days were spent studying and acting the fool,
ain’t much has changed, save for a new building or two,
new trees also planted, that place still looking good,
the shopping area lay not too far ahead, down the road, after a row of homes, where the old train station served as a dead end.
The shops remain closed, their owners still laid up in bed,
felt like I’d stumbled upon a ghost town or post-apocalyptic scene, like a plague had wiped the city clean,
Had me cringing, thinking of some Black Death shit,
sure was hella nasty, some of those chapters in early human history,
took a walk through some narrow lanes, the side of buildings tattooed by street art,
decided to pass through and got a taste of the sucky part,
disappointingly the paths remain littered and neglected,
leading to the back of buildings and parking lots, equally derelict and deserted.

Passed by a store, foreign-owned and sporting a typo on the window,
neighboring a vacant lot, finally leased and ready to rock,
soon I’m staring at the station, fenced away from the road,
an old building stands across, now a pub, said to be over one hundred years old,
the station’s facade remains the same since childhood days, though not for much longer,
construction work had started, a facelift if you will, that sure is a downer,
I see a few joggers now, a group of cyclists and some cars now making an appearance,
store owners now also gracing the scene with their presence,
the day has begun, time sure did fly,
ghost town no more, this place has come to life,
headed back north towards the car, parked in front of the home I once lived,
it’s still in good nick, a preserved relic, I wonder who now owns it?
Time to call it a morning, that’s enough for today,
enjoy your day, folks, I’ll be back next Saturday.

‘Don’t call it a comeback, I’ve been here for years!’
So rapped LL Cool J in that hit song of his,
Two last-minute speed bumps in my way, got through them anyway,
D-Day’s finally here,
Time to kick it into gear.

19/10/2018

The end of October marked my return to the Wing Chun Academy after months of fighting and recuperating from ulcerative colitis. It had been a long time coming and once the 19^th of October rolled around I woke up feeling like Buster Douglas when he beat Mike Tyson, a victory that, to this day, still stands as the biggest upset in boxing history. Ok, that was a very cheesy comparison but colitis (SEVERE pancolitis to be exact) was what Iron Mike had once been in and out of the boxing ring; an extremely violent and merciless prick that took no prisoners and I fought that thing and came out on top.
But first, I had to deal with two last-minute hiccups. Actually, scratch that – it was one little hiccup and followed by a massive scare that threatened to derail my progress.
Let me explain.
The little hiccup arrived in the form of an e-mail that I had received from Dr. B during one particular day in which he instructed me to increase my Imuran dosage from two tablets per day to three, apparently in order to speed up my recovery by further preventing that traitorous, vindictive motherfucker also known as my immune system from attacking my body. It seemed like a reasonable arrangement and the payoff was appealing but in the mind of a man recovering from a hellish disease it definitely raised some concern.

Oh no……is there a problem!?

I sat down and had a brief talk about it with my father, during which he reassured me that I should think of it as Dr. B urging me to get to the finish line faster, not a sign that I had regressed.
“Son, if it was bad news I’m pretty sure he would have summoned you to his clinic right away and booked another surgical procedure for you,” he reasoned.
Put that way it did take the edge off and once I increased the dosage it didn’t seem to have any serious side-effects

Ok, so all was good, right? Well, not quite. Let’s look at the shocker moment.

One day, as I was taking a walk around a shopping center I began to feel a familiar kind of discomfort, one that I hadn’t felt in quite some time. Initially, I tried to ignore it and kept walking without a care in the world but that’s when it decided to be more persuasive.
First, my stomach began to feel funny.
That funny feeling then began to feel quite painful.
That discomfort then made its way a little down south……

GET TO DA CRAPPER!!!!!!

Yes, that was written – or rather, shouted – in Arnold Schwarzenegger’s voice.

I frantically searched for the nearest restroom on the ground floor that I was traipsing around in and while it didn’t take long to find it I was suddenly confronted by a sign that hung on the restroom door on which inscribed were the last words I wanted to read;
‘Under construction, sorry for the inconvenience.’
YOU HAVE GOTTA BE KIDDING ME!!! WHAT ARE THE CHANCES!!!???
I thought bouts of sheer dumb bad luck such as this only occurred in TV sitcoms.
Cursing my luck and resisting the urge to kick that fucking door down, I turned tail and made my way to the nearest escalator to go up one level, practically bobbing, weaving, spinning and bulldozing my way up that conveyor through the line of people content to stand still like a rugby player evading on-coming players on the way to the try-line. I was in total panic mode and I swear I heard The Flight Of The Bumblebee ringing in my mind as I struggled to keep the bombs from dropping long before I’d reached the assigned target as my stomach continued to grumble. I never accidentally hit anyone on my way up that escalator but it must have shocked them to see a man zoom past them like The Flash.

Sorry, folks. It’s a matter of health and dignity!

I quickly scanned the first floor upon hopping off the escalator and found the restroom, thankfully just a few feet away. No ‘under construction’ signs here, I dashed straight in like a man caught under a sudden downpour looking for shelter, into an empty cubicle and did my business. I honestly believed that had I not reached the restroom when I did I would have messed myself right there in the mall, giving horrified and bewildered on-lookers a live re-enactment of THAT scene from the film Dumb and Dumber.
That surely would have been a shitty situation.
Sorry, Dear Readers, I couldn’t resist! Feel free to face-palm.
Once I had unloaded I decided that it would be a good idea to take a peek at the results. I hadn’t felt that dreaded ‘Oh shit!’ feeling since the height of my suffering a few months ago and was hopeful that everything was still normal as far ‘number twos’ were concerned and so I slowly took a glance, expecting no nasty surprises.

Oh, what’s that pinkish hue there? I know I didn’t eat any beetroot over the last few days.

I slowly looked up, blinked several times and took another look. Surely I was just seeing things.

Still there.

With fear now manifesting itself in the pit of my stomach I stood straight up and took another glance and at that moment the entire world ceased to exist and I found myself trapped once again in that agonizing envelope of deep, dark nothingness, similar to what I’d felt after I’d performed burpees during the height of my then-undiagnosed anaemia.

What the fuck is that pink doing there!!!???

Dr. B’s latest e-mail may have triggered alarm bells to my psyche but this was a catastrophic disaster on a similar scale to the eruption of Krakatoa. Resisting the urge to scream out in agony and treat the blue-grey cubicle walls as my personal punching bags, I slowly sat back down and cleaned myself up as the feelings of shock and disbelief washed over me before flushing the toilet and then washing my hands. I then left the restroom, completely dejected, dragging my feet as I slowly made my way to the parking lot like a man that had been robbed at gunpoint, a stark contrast to the spring in my step and the swagger that I had carried with me just ten minutes earlier. I was practically numb with anxiety for the remainder of the day as that familiar, sickening phobia of using the toilet once again set up camp in my mind, again accompanied by that fear of losing more blood the next time I went.

Man, I left this behind months ago! What the fuck happened!?

My mind immediately ran itself ragged wondering if my run of good fortune was only a mirage and that the Imuran and Mezavant had only served to temporarily halt the monster. Perhaps this was the part where colitis would suddenly return following a couple of months in the wilderness, revitalized and with revenge and mayhem in its mind. If that was the case then I would have to explore new treatment options – which meant that cutting out my bowels and walking around with a colostomy bag hanging off of my abdomen would once again become a possibility.

Urgh, pass me the bucket, I’m gonna be sick!

The thought of it made my skin crawl. My team of doctors, family and I had been doing everything we could to avoid that fate and to this day, we still are. No, no way. That will NEVER be an option as far as I’m concerned!
But then something happened to restore the peace. I felt another urge to ‘go’ later that night and upon relieving myself in the bathroom, I took a peek once again and everything seemed fine and it’s been fine ever since. I guess that scare must have been a minor flare-up and a response to the extra dose of Imuran.

Bullshit. Try again, bro.

Ok, fine. Maybe it was partially my fault, too.

While it might have been a response to the extra dose, it may have also been triggered by my allowing myself to slack off with my diet as of late, at times feasting like King Adolf Frederick of Sweden did during his last night of life. Despite my rather short stature I am a pretty big eater on a good day, although in my defense it’s because I am an active person, but I had been warned by Dr. B that I should not place too much strain on my bowels as I was still recovering. I listened to his advice and complied but every now and then I slipped up and literally bit off more than I can chew. The bowel, naturally, felt overwhelmed too soon and let me know about it in a rather frightening manner. It was one thing to be able to work out and leave the house, but I still needed to go easy on my digestive system and perhaps this little setback was the bowel’s way of saying, “slow down, jerk!!!! I ain’t 100% yet!”

Ok, you made your point clear. I’ll be good!

Anyway, my return to the Wing Chun Academy was scheduled for the 19^th of October. Much to my disbelief and although I had anticipated it, my parents were a little uneasy, my mother in particular. She feared that participating in any athletic or strenuous endeavor would somehow ‘over-work’ me and that I’d get sick again or worse. Never mind the fact that I’ve been going there for more than five years and was aware that I had to exercise some caution for the time being but apparently, she’d prefer that I lived like an old man whose best days had passed him and accept that I was no longer built for any form of athletic endeavor or anything particularly adventurous all because of this damn disease whose ass I’d just stomped.
I could only shake my head and roll my eyes. I did not fight back hard just to spend the rest of my life ‘playing it safe’ and living like a reclusive hypochondriac. The prospect of being the very best version of myself again, which included being strong and athletic, was what had sustained me over these last few months and Dr. B had also made it his personal mission to get me back into ‘fighting shape’ and to be able to live a normal life again. Fuck colitis and its after effects, I will never submit to that motherfucker.

I repeat, FUCK colitis and its after-effects, I will NEVER, EVER submit to that motherfucker.

I stood my ground and calmly reminded her, and Dad too, for that matter, that I had made it clear as day that I would reclaim ‘the real me’ once I had defeated colitis, that I would never allow myself to live in fear of it for the rest of my life and that Dr. B had given me the green light and dismissed any notion that being active would cause a flare-up, and that it was the cause of the colitis in the first place, a proposition that Dr. G had literally laughed off too, by the way. But I guess it’s a typical case of a mother being worried for her kids and I understood that she believed that she was looking out for my best interests but trying to talk me into living a life that I would grow to hate?

Sorry, Mom, I appreciate the concern but I think I know what works best for me more than anyone and I’m going for it.

My parents eventually let me be, such was the conviction in my tone when I told them that I was not going to be denied, and once the 19^th of October rolled around, I made my way to the Academy, excitement swimming through my system as I entered the building and climbed up the stairs leading to the entrance. I heard the familiar sound of bags and pads being pounded on my way up accompanied by the sound of students and instructors encouraging one another.I was quite impressed by the turn-out on this particular Friday evening as I entered, with students on just about every corner of the room. Physically, the interior remained the same, save for a bigger, newer shelf that had replaced the decaying one that previously – and barely – held various pads, gloves and protective gear. The giant red punching bag that hung close to the front desk nicknamed ‘Big Red’ remained, still bearing the scars from a lifetime spent absorbing countless kicks, palm strikes and punches.

Looks like the old boy’s still standing strong.

My presence was instantly noticed by one of my friends and the rest of the class seemed to quickly follow suit and what happened next was a pleasant surprise. The whole class, students, instructors and even the staff behind the front desk, literally stopped what they were doing and gave me a rousing round of applause. It was truly humbling and I waved to everyone and bowed in appreciation for their grand gesture, grinning from ear-to-ear.

I’m home, Fam. I’ve missed you all.

Once all greetings and exchanges of hugs, handshakes and fist-bumps were through it was back to business as usual with training before teaching a group of grade three students during the last scheduled class for the evening for yours truly. I was a little rusty and did my best not to push myself too hard as per Dr. B’s orders but I think it was a decent session.
I did the rounds and caught up with everyone in between and after classes and just as it was during my friend’s house party a few weeks earlier, I gave them a brief rundown of the last few months, confirming their suspicions before my absence that I had been battling a rather serious illness.
Well damn…..did I really look that bad!?
You most certainly did, Buddy.
Yep, it turned out that my training partners-slash-friends, bless them, had silently been concerned about my health the entire time but didn’t want to say it out loud, although some did tell me every once in a while shortly before the transfusion that I looked pale, thin and wasn’t my usual self. Meanwhile, I carried on pretending that all was well.

How thick can you get!? You looked like shit and they knew it but didn’t want to hurt your feelings. You weren’t fooling nobody!

Of those to whom that I shared my horror story there were some that were vaguely aware of what ulcerative colitis was. Many more, however, weren’t quite so sure and gasped when I described to them the symptoms and treatment.
How is this fucking evil disease not yet widely known!?
I had no firm grounds for outrage since I myself was ignorant of it until I was diagnosed. I guess what they say is true, you never know the severity and magnitude of a challenge unless it happens to you or someone you love and that anything can happen to anybody. And Dr. B had informed me, with a tone of resignation in his voice might I add, that there were still no real remedies available for this disease, nor have the true causes been identified and are, for now, largely speculative. Either the powers that be don’t know, are still in the process of finding a cure or, worse, they are not getting the help they need.
What a shame. I wouldn’t wish this shit upon my worst enemy.
But it was good vibes all around at the Academy, nothing awkward at all, and once I had filled everyone in on the reasons for my absence we quickly picked up right where we left off, in terms of training and what was happening in everyone else’s lives. Work lives, family lives, holidays, triumphs and troubles, congratulating students that have successfully climbed up the grades……..no stone was left unturned. It truly felt great to be back.

An anecdote from another friend at the Academy on the following Tuesday truly brought home just how badly the colitis had ravaged me. This particular friend also practiced Brazilian Jiu-jitsu and a couple of weeks before my transfusion, shortly before a sparring class, he demonstrated a move on me that he had been working on that involved lifting me off the floor. He explained to me that he had braced himself prior to executing the move on me that day as he was expecting to lift a decent amount of weight off the floor but it turned out he needn’t had bothered since I was, apparently, light as a feather. Picking up a travel bag packed to bursting levels would have required more effort than my sick, underweight self.

Yikes!   

Anyway, I’ve continued to train and teach at the Wing Chun Academy ever since in addition to continuing with my recovery. I know that returning to martial arts training didn’t really count for all that much in the grand scheme of things but for me it was a monumental achievement and that was why I had bristled at my mother’s suggestion to quit. Again, I understood where she was coming from and I guess I should consider myself fortunate that she cared enough for me to speak up but for me, life would have been meaningless if I didn’t allow myself to live it the way I wanted to and partake in activities that I enjoyed. By returning I had fulfilled both a personal goal and one part of Dr. B’s mission and also showed that fucking colitis that it couldn’t keep me down.
The next part? That’s the big one, Dear Reader – the complete remission of the colitis before completely weaning me off of my medication.
Things could only get better from here on out and I still had two more months before the year was over. Bring on November and December, looks like Christmas was going to be sweet!