Be a Bitch or Get an Autoimmune Disease
Online lately, there has been a lot of discourse over the phrase in the title: “Be a Bitch or Get an Autoimmune Disease.”
As a bitch with an autoimmune disease, I can attest to its accuracy. This phrase keeps snagging my thoughts lately, it Is evocative. What other words or traits do you think of? Difficult, stubborn, demanding, abrasive, cold hearted, combative, outspoken…..
Do you think of a man or do you think of a woman? Now lets flip it. Think of all the things you associate with the word “leader”.
Determined, confident, formidable, commanding, decisive, resolute, indomitable….
Again, who do you picture?
I was nineteen when my symptoms started. “Did you have any major stresses lately? We often see that an instance of trauma can bring Celiac Disease out of dormancy.” The doctor asks this as a doctor does, not as a friend does. He doesn’t look up from his chart. There is a comfort in the clinical analysis of trauma and emotional pain, it was validating in some strange way.
“Yeah, about 7 months ago I had to flee an abuser.” I respond as a patient does, not as a friend does. I am staring blankly at a poster of the digestive tract. What the heck does a gallbladder even do? How on earth do all those intestines fit in there?
“And when did the symptoms start?” My gaze tugs away from the poster and back to the doctor.
“6 months ago.”
“Hm.”
It didn’t feel real when it all happened. When I left, part of me kept assuming I was being overdramatic, or making things up, or not strong enough. A deeper part of me, the survival part, knew the truth. They don’t call it survival mode for nothing. That primitive part of my brain came forward to save me when nothing else could.
This gastroenterologist was only the first doctor to bring up trauma as a cause for my health issues. Then it was the orthopedic surgeon “how did you break your pelvis and 2 lumbar vertebrae?” Then the Opthamologist “Did you sustain head trauma as a child?” Then, a Psychiatrist, who ended up having more questions than what I could list here.
I began to realize that I had survived, but I had not kept myself safe. I had been submissive, quiet, and obedient, allowing things to happen rather than upset anyone. There came a point where I had to decide not only to survive, but keep myself safe, to take care of myself. Now, I often get called a leader. It isn’t because I changed all that much, its because now, I’m a raging bitch.
