Pressure from family

I love my bag!

My family has not been very involved in my UC days. They definitely did NOT understand my life with it!

But once I decided on major surgery and got it - they finally figured out it was a big deal living with UC. So much thatd id rather change my anatomy than deal with it anymore.

Im not sure how old you are - but it doesnt matter what your mom says. Or your dad. Brother. Sister. Grandma. Mother in law. Aunts or uncles.

All that matters is YOUR quality of life.

tell your mom that if she wants to continue receiving free hair styling, to shut her pie hole !

Post Edited (soystud) : 11/2/2014 5:51:31 AM (GMT-7)

I know she's trying to help, but she has never walked in your shoes. Did she hate her bag when she had one? Obviously not, because she never had one. She also never had UC.

Sometimes the best response can be just "Thanks for your concern, mom. When I decide what's best for me I'll let you know."

Embers glow- I'm happy you like the bag :) it probably is way better than before!!

Hah, I have the same problem but different - my mom won't stop urging me to get surgery. She even came with me to a doctors appointment once and tried and convince the doctor to give me the surgery! He told her what I've been saying all along - it's not the right decision for me right now, my meds are quite effective for my current condition.
We have a family friend who had bad Crohn's disease who says surgery saved his life and he's never been happier, so she wants the same for me. I think parent's just try and help but they don't necessarily know what they're talking about. After meeting my doctor she became more understanding. Maybe hearing the opinion of a medical professional would help your mother understand too.

about 9 years ago my mother in law had a perforated bowel (likely from her diverticulosis) and she wore a bag for about a year and to this day (she still has tummy troubles) she always says how much better she felt with the bag on (kinda like she's trying to coax me into getting a bag for my crohn's colitis---which is in remission, now just dealing with annoying IBS alternating D and C) so every time she brings it up I keep telling her to go ahead and get the bag again, then she stops mentioning it for a while.

People are definitely fricken annoying with "their" suggestions they try to push onto others.

Actually I'm not sure how people, even family members can give informed advice on something as important like this.

Personally I don't really talk to my mum very often, she has a way of upsetting me, and that's even before the subject of UC even arises...its a shame, but some people get the short straw when it comes to parents.

It's not something they can even comprehend. You can't understand the mental and physical stress this disease puts on you. Impossible. Even new people with UC don't get it. See it in posts here. I didn't come to my breaking point on surgery until I went 4 months with no sleep. That was 8 years into my disease.

You should send them to this forum if they would like an idea of what this disease is.

Just to be on your mother's side for a microsecond, there are many who are members here who would hold on to their colons through thick and thin, no matter what, and would refuse to have a bag (or other). Everyone has their own preferences (including those of us with the disease) but when you don't have the disease yourself, empathy is all but gone. It's possible that if she were in your shoes she might be one of those who would fight surgery until the end of the Earth. Maybe you're being too hard on her but, in the end, this your life and your decision.

I didn't even know about surgery when I first got sick; my family wanted me to try a natural/wholestic approach and after that didn't work after trying it for 3 months I ended up in the hospital for 24 days because I was so sick. While in the hospital I found out about surgery and my family was dead-set against surgery. I ended up being transferred to a teaching hospital to quote "they could save my colon" with either Cyclosporine or a experimental drug. My world was in total disarray at the time from the UC and I couldn't make a good decision for myself so I let other people help make the decision for me which was a mistake. Unfortunately the Cyclospoine worked, I wish that it didn't and my colon was saved to only need to have it removed 8 years later. I should have had it removed the first time I got really sick.

My mother after I had surgery last year and she saw that I was doing really well said "I don't know why you didn't have surgery years ago". I was like because my entire family was against it.

I don't understand the whole bag thing being a big issue, it's only temporary for 3-6 months and you're recovering most of time. The J-pouch is most-likely for the rest of your life and there are good stats to prove it. For me, living with a bag was so much better than living with Severe UC.

I had the opposite problem. My family and friends were begging me to have the surgery. I was wasting away in front of them. It caused a lot of tension between my hubby and I at the time because I was stubborn and didn't want to have surgery at first. It took me a good two years to come to terms with the fact that I was out of options and needed to do it. And since my sister has a 23 year old J pouch, I got tons of pressure from her to make that leap of faith! So glad I did.

Good luck with whatever the future holds for you. You will know if and when the time comes for surgery.