Living

Do you ever feel jealous that bears get to hibernate through the holidays? They go sauntering into their caves, easy as they please to nap through the lousy weather, shopping...

Having a chronic illness like ankylosing spondylitis takes its toll on us physically, but it also takes a huge toll on us mentally, too. It’s no secret that a lot...

I’m sure most of us have at least one (or more) family member that just doesn’t quite get what we go through. No matter how many times we try to...

Have you ever seen a high drama press conference? They tend to follow a formula. Something big happened and we know that lots of uncomfortable and repetitive questions are about to fly...

I'm not sure if you know this, dear reader, but my background is in poetry! I got a Master's degree in writing (yes, I do have regrets), I've published several...

Growing up, I had heard of others in my family being diagnosed with serious and life-changing illnesses, but they were older. That's when life deals that card to us. It's...

Lately, I’ve been experiencing an SI joint flare-up. I’ve had the fatigue, the difficulty moving around, the all-over pain, and just about everything else. I started to wonder what other...

Medical appointments seem simple enough: just book, show up, be seen, and follow up, right? Wrong! For many of us, patient care may as well be happening on the dark...

Keegan knows when a storm is coming, and often more accurately than what my iPhone weather app tells me. Changes in the weather, particularly large shift in temperature, pressure, and/or...

The summer of 2019 was the most stressful time of my life. I put The Dude (my elderly uncle and Ward) on hospice, sold his house on an emergency basis...

If you read my article “The River Denial” (all about the difficulty of asking for and accepting accommodations) you read that I was planning on taking my wheelchair to the...

If you don’t deal with chronic pain or illness, you’re probably wondering what it’s actually like to experience a flare-up. Lucky for you, I’ve been through enough for a lifetime...

I'm writing this article to air a frustration I have with something a lot of us with AS have to deal with. I feel like I’m constantly fighting for myself...

Have you ever fallen asleep watching one movie and woke up to another? One minute Harrison Ford is Indiana Jones, then you pull that soft blanket up under your chin...

The notion that people could fake a disability is widely held in our culture. Maybe it's a form of denial around life changing illness and disability? Maybe it's because we...

I'm naturally a highly empathic person. In my research of ankylosing spondylitis, I kept reading about the chronic pain but wanted to know more. How painful is it really? What...

Imagine a spondylitis patient called Shawn. She's an African-American forty-something that most people think younger because she's prone to giggling, can't stop retweeting anything with frolicking otters, and wears lip...

I feel like a lot of people that follow me on social media probably wonder “Why is she so open about everything?”. Why do I talk so much about my...

Living with AS can feel like a buzz saw merry-go-round. The saw blades are composed of the health issues and symptoms we're fighting back against. The merry-go-round, a mash-up of...

If you had to pick 1 aspect of your life that has been most affected by AS, what would it be and how have you coped with that? If I...