“Hey were you pregnant? You missed a lot of school, and I heard someone say you had an abortion.”

The first time I heard one of the rumors about me, my face had never been more red. My mind immediately went to “deny deny deny” and all I wanted to do was crawl into a hole and never come out. The rumor was justified. I had missed nearly three weeks of school- but it couldn’t have been farther from the truth.

The second semester of my sophomore year was the worst time in my life. Towards the end of January, I began uncontrollably and sporadically throwing up. It didn’t matter where I was, what I had eaten, or the time of the day. I needed to be within five feet of a trashcan at all times. My head constantly felt like my brain was about to burst and the achy feeling never left my body. If I could sleep- which was rare- it was in short bursts, and I always felt more tired than before.

At the beginning, I missed about three weeks of school when we didn’t know if I was contagious or not. After multiple visits my doctor concluded I wasn’t contagious and could go back to school. He gave me an antibiotic to try, then sent me on my way.

When I got back to school, that’s when I heard the rumors for the first time. My friends and boyfriend had done their best to contain them and keep me protected from it all, but that didn’t stop people’s curiosity. Two days after I went back to school, an uncommon side effect from the antibiotic popped up. The medicine made me lose control of my bowels, and on top of that, I was still throwing up.

I remember sitting in English, and then suddenly having to run out the door. The closest bathroom was locked. And then the next closest bathroom was locked as well. I didn’t make it to the bathroom in time. I called my mom, crying hysterically from the bathroom stall, explaining that I left my backpack in the classroom and I needed a change of clothes and a shower. A similar instance like that happened six more times in the next few days before my doctor took me off of the antibiotic.

Over the next few weeks I had so many medical test. I learned that if I wasn’t laying down when I had my blood drawn, I would pass out. I learned that you’re not supposed to eat six hours before a sonogram (I had two of those). I learned that every time you see a new doctor when you have my symptoms, they will always do a pregnancy test. And every single time the tests came back normal. We were crossing things off the list of what it couldn’t be, but not getting any closer to figuring out what it was.

After the third-or-so test, my doctor wanted to do an MRI. He said that sometimes patients with a rare brain tumor exhibit similar symptoms as me, and he just wanted to double check. I was terrified, but I refused to cry.

On Valentine’s Day I had an MRI at Cook Children’s. It was super romantic. There’s nothing quite like laying completely still in a metal tube, while loud sounds are banging on around you. After it was over, the only thing it showed was that I had the largest sinus infection they had ever seen. I immediately went on more strong antibiotics. Those antibiotics had the side effect I had experienced before, but I had to continue them, so I could get rid of the massive sinus infection.

Imagine being a 16-year old girl in high school, who was uncontrollably throwing up and pooping her pants at school. I was a wreck. And my doctors still couldn’t explain all of my symptoms. I continued to try different medicines and have different tests, all with minimal to no results.

Some days I went to school, other days I didn’t. Often times I would go to school, something would happen, my dad would come pick me up so I could shower and calm down, and I would then go back.

One day, I didn’t make it to a trashcan fast enough, and there was a girl blocking it. I threw up on her hair and all over myself. I had never been more mortified in my life. Luckily she was super nice about it, but I called my mom, asking her to pick me up. That was the only day I refused to go back.

Over spring break, I had a scope and colonoscopy. Some people went to the beach, whereas I had a camera stuck up my butt. I think we all know who the real winner is. The day before, I wasn’t allowed to eat anything and I had to do a “cleanse.” That was fun. The procedure itself wasn’t awful, but it wasn’t my favorite either.

Through it all, I missed a lot of school and didn’t get to see my friends much. The feeling of not being able to control your own body was terrible. I began to have anxiety and panic attacks, where I felt like there wasn’t enough of air in the room. I was trying my best to keep up in school and with all my extracurriculars, but it was nearly impossible.

A few weeks before school got out, my parents and teachers put together a plan for me to get caught up in a low stress environment, where I didn’t have to worry about throwing up in front of (or on) any of my classmates. For two weeks I worked in the library churning out makeup work, while my teachers came and tutored me during their free periods. My teachers were rock stars, making me only do the work that was absolutely necessary. I slowly got caught up and began going to a few of my core classes.

After a few weeks, I was mostly caught up and was back in all of my classes full time. I was still throwing up- not as often- but by then I knew how to handle it. I started to go to therapy, and learned a few tricks for handling my anxiety. I latched on to my friends and finished out the school year, barely.

We never fully figured out what was wrong with me. My doctor thinks that at the beginning I legitimately had an infection of some sort, and all the antibiotics for it wiped out my immune system. And that coupled with all the stress of missing school formed the perfect storm. The weaker my immune system got, the more stuff I caught, which in turn made me miss school and become even more stressed, which didn’t help my immune system. It was a whole vicious cycle.

But I’m over it now, and now feel like I can handle anything that life throws at me. It was terrifying—for both me and my poor parents—but I’m a much stronger person now because of it. And after that kind of sophomore year, junior year should be a breeze!