Need info on dating someone with Crohn's

welcome to the site, I too am about your girlfriends height and weight I went through 4 suregeries back in 07/08 and have had this disease since I was 8 (24 years now). CCFA.org is a great starter site as far as information. As far as the gym goes I would be wary not all of us can nadle working out (i even joined a Curves since the owner had CD and the machines etc were all supposed to be easy on the Crohn's arthritis issues) it casued me to be bed ridden for 2 weeks. every person is different as far as excersize and diet thouigh and you kind of have to test the waters.

Welcome southpawcannon. I have to agree with dragonfly. Look into CCFA.org. They have support groups and it might help if the two of you went to one together. It gives you a support structure not only to help you in times of need, but you can be there to help others that need it. I have learned a lot about this disease from CCFA. I have had Crohn's for about 23 years now and I have to say that CCFA helped me deal with this disease a lot. I have gone to lectures put out by them and have used their support groups.

I have to agree with firecracker1 here, don't try to solve any Crohns related problems she has, just be there and listen and support as much as you can. If she is feeling bad, and too tired to fix something to eat, maybe you can offer to fix it for her, or get things for her.

And I have to agree not alot of us can do too much exercise. This disease not only affects our guts but our joints, eyes, skin etc. So if all she can do is walk on a treadmill for a couple minutes, at least she has done that. But don't be surprised if she can't do that. A few exercise on this forum, but most of them are not flaring as she is right now.

Its great you are trying to educate yourself. And she is lucky to have you, Hugs!

Hey Southpawcannon,
I think you are awesome for taking the time to join up here and ask questions to better understand and help your girlfriend...the others above have some great suggestions....regarding the prednisone and trouble sleeping, it's pretty common to have this side effect UNLESS all the pred is taken first thing in the early morning, but that's about the only control one can have over their pred, the rest of the side effects cannot be controlled much, besides trying to cut down on salty foods to help with puffyness that pred can cause but the cravings for some people over take them.

This site itself is full of info that you're looking for, I encourage you to read through the many pages here to learn more about how complex this disease can be and how very individual it is as well since no two CDers are exactly alike, therefore different things will help different CDers.


Exercise is great and super important, but since she was just in the hospital that's a pretty good indication of how terribly she's doing with her CD at the moment...in time when she feels better I think that's when some kind of exercise routine would be good for her....infact I think considering how tiny she is to begin with, yoga would be great for her and there's so many forms of yoga to choose from, pilates would be good too. Most importantly, she'll have a good idea when she can start and what all she can tolerate, so gentle suggestions on your part is the way I'd go, you don't want to come off "pushy" on her cuz if she's not ready then she may feel like she's disappointing you and herself and you don't want her feeling that way cuz with the way CD can affect us emotionally it's bad enough (some of us tend to beat ourselves up emotionally often because of guilty feeling for being sick even though we cannot help it that we got sick).

Hope she feels better soon, best of luck to you both.

Wow! She's lucky to have a GI that is well versed in diet. That is very rare : ) Many more GI dr's s/b more educated and aware of diet and the effect it can have on Crohn's.