The Girl Who Cried Wolf - A Column by Kristi Page

When you think of ultimate frustration you think of the phrase, “ripping my hair out.” However, there’s no need for me to do that because in the past few weeks it’s started to thin and fall out on its own. Earlier in the year, it felt like I…

I’ve been blessed with many supportive souls since my lupus diagnosis, a few of whom also live with chronic illness. One of them, along with her partner, has taught me a most valuable lesson, by being my constant reminder that sometimes it’s not about leaps and bounds, but…

Every Thursday, I get up early – a feat in itself – and drive half an hour to meet my personal trainer for a 45-minute pain-and-sweat session. While I love these mornings, they come at a cost. If I’ve made plans with someone later in the day, it…

Veganism is a popular topic of late and, while I have opinions, its nutritional merits are not what I want to write about. Rather, as someone who lives on a medical – read: necessary and involuntary – elimination diet, I wish to kindly ask the vegan community not…

I’ve always been fascinated by tattoos. Why people get them, what each piece of art on their skin means to them, or if it’s important at all. It’s hard to choose something to emblazon on you skin for the rest of your days and I had yet to…

Being diagnosed, I felt like the weight of the world got lifted off me. But slowly, as I began to understand more and more, I started to feel something else. I felt heavy and hopeless with my new lack of possibilities in life. Over the last month or…

There are plenty of things I dislike about lupus, and a few I’d go as far to say I hate. But the thing I hate most? It is how lupus is the only thing in my whole life that has made me feel truly uncomfortable in my own…

I recall a time where there were only two types of days: Good ones and bad ones. Of late, there are all kinds of days broken down into little categories. While overall a day can be considered “good,” that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s been like that on every…

It doesn’t matter when or where I tell someone I have lupus, the reaction is always the same. The person’s face will drop as they realize I’ve just shared with them that I have a illness I’ll live with forever. Cue the onset of sympathetic and pitied glances.

I’ve always been an over-thinker. There’s rarely a time when there isn’t something racing through my head. But it used to be different, a lot more carefree and a little less serious than it is in my present. Now I don’t just over-think, I over-worry – and it’s…