"BUT YOU LOOK SO HAPPY AND HEALTHY”. SHUT UP.

Having an “invisible illness” is annoying. I mean, it wouldn’t be so invisible if I walked around in a crop top, but whatever.

I've literally been at death's door time and time again and always get the same comment from some poor, uneducated soul: “but you look so healthy and happy on Facebook.”

I guess I’m supposed to live looking a hot a$$ mess with a sign on my four head that states: “close to death, ya’ll.”

Heck no

I go out and live it. I've spent a whole year locked in my house with a newborn. The first half of that year, because I refused to leave with an extra butt, the second half of that year, because I couldn’t stop sh*tting my pants. Beautiful.

I fought through crippling anxiety anytime my husband “made” me go out, or when I finally applied for a job, or when I simply just went to the grocery store.

Oh, the places I have...

...pooped myself! When they tried to get my original butt working again, I pooped at the pumpkin patch, my daughter’s first birthday party, countless restaurants, night’s out on the town. I used to despise my husband for making me leave the house.

The best thing that ever happened was developing a sick sense of humor. I enjoy baffling people and making them extremely uncomfortable. Now, when I’m at work and the Niagara Falls of poop starts running down my legs, when I’m at the water park covered in sh*t, when I’m in the middle of a lake on a boat projectile pooping, I laugh and cry hysterically at the same time. Nobody really knows how to react to this, so it works well.

I want to freaking live!

I REFUSE to be chained to my house and I refuse to not give my daughter every experience because I poop everywhere. I refuse to not go out on a date with my husband even if poop ends up all over me the one night a month I get dressed up. My daughter calmly tells me I need to fix my “boo boo.” My husband waits in the booth while I stuff toilet paper in every nook and cranny. Then, I wipe my tears, laugh at how stupid life is, then get back to living.

My husband took me to the first Razorback game of the season this Fall. I spent the ride to Fayetville cleaning up my poop and attempting to get my bag to cooperate. I cried, begged to go home, took my anxiety meds, then calmed myself down. Of course, I ended up having the best time and tried all the stadium food even if it did give me diarrhea, because d*mn it, I want to freaking live.

My in-house nurse

I wish people treated me with the same pureness as my 3 year old. She’s completely cool with my butts as long as I “don’t poop on her head.” There have been some close calls, so this is a pretty reasonable request. My daughter may as well be my nurse. She looks under my shirt 50 times a day, let’s me know when I need a change, then stands by me while I’m changing my bag, handing me every supply I need in order. After, she kisses my stomach and “pets” my boo boo. She lifts up her shirt and wonders where her boo boo is.

How am I not supposed to live for that?