Girls With Guts

Loud and Proud: Donna’s Mission to Erase Ostomy Stigmas
A few weeks ago, ostomies were given bad coverage on an English tv programme, a channel which regularly views IBD and ostomies in a bad light. With this began fellow ostomates posting pictures of themselves proudly showing their bags. Around the same time I read posts from friends and fell ...
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Girls With Guts 2013 Retreat!
We are so proud and excited to announce that registration for the 2013 Retreat is open! For all the details, please visit the event page!
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Actor and IBDer Ken Baumann On IBD, Ostomies, Sexiness, and Beauty: “The most beautiful people I know are the kindest.”
Quickly: I want to remind you why you shouldn’t let Crohn’s or colitis define your sense of self, sexiness, or beauty. Paula Pell sums it up nicely. I agree with Paula. Sexiness is much more than a symmetrical face, a chic weight, whatever. The sexiest women I know are all—fi ...
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From Start to Finish: Keri Ann’s Fight Against Crohn’s Disease
Five years ago it was 2007 and I was a freshman in college. I was ready to begin the next chapter of my life. And I was up for a challenge. Little did I know, I was already facing what would prove to be my greatest challenge thus far. Most people take on a challenge [...]
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Alyssa’s Story: Going Public
It’s about time I wrote this. You see, I have been procrastinating for quite a while now because I have been feeling sick and sad. That shouldn’t matter here, in a community where we are loved and welcomed regardless of our condition, but I wanted my contribution to Girls with Guts to ...
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The Origins of the Restroom Access Act by Ally Bain
A person’s voice as an advocate is the greatest instrument in speaking for millions of others to acknowledge an achievement, combat a stigma, or help pass a law to protect the rights of people across the country. A person’s voice is more than the sound when he or she speaks. It is the ...
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Girls With Guts teams up with Groupon Grassroots!
We are so excited to annouce our biggest fundraising event to date! Girls With Guts has partnered with Groupon Grassroots, which is the philanthropic arm of Groupon. Grassroots is helping us to fund a new program we’ve been wanting to implement for a while but we just haven’t h ...
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Let’s Be Heard: Great Comebacks Award Winner Mary Penner Speaks Up
I had an interesting experience this week. While I’ve been very open about my ostomy at work in the last 18 months by leading a team of 7 IBM volunteers to reinvent Ostomy Toronto, having my ostomy and volunteer work talked about on a poster that went up all across Canada for the 2011 IB ...
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Living With – Not Suffering From – Crohn’s Disease: Olympian Carrie Johnson
I was in my first year of undergraduate work at UCSD and starting my first year of senior level sprint kayak training when I started having minor G.I. issues – I thought I just had a stomach bug and when they continued I thought it might be stress related. Being a competitive and str ...
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Celebrating Oscar D. Ostomy With Allie
I love parties. Big, small, indoors, outdoors, themed, casual, you name it, if it involves a gathering of friends and family, I am all over it! What I really love the most though, is hosting a party and giving it some sort of silly title. Shin digs end up being called “extravaganza&# ...
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Alicia’s Story: Tell the class something they wouldn’t know just by looking at you
Ready, set…play. I stood up in front of my class as the video started. Palms sweaty, heart racing, my eyes glanced around the room trying to gauge the reactions of my peers. The images of my previous hospitalizations and the reveal of my ostomy bag were plastered all over the screen. Una ...
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Jennie’s Story: Osto-Me
Jennie is one of our neighbors to the north in Canada and she is also one of the masterminds behind The Gutsy Generation! All I wanted for my 19th birthday was an ostomy. I would joke with the nurses and doctors that if they didn’t take my colon out for me, I was going to [...]
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Jes’s Story: Pregnant with an Ostomy
Jes’ Story: Pregnant with an Ostomy June 21, 2012- It’s a boy! My husband’s eyes welling up with tears and I can’t help but bawl my eyes out as the ultrasound technician grins widely at us. I, we, can’t believe it and can’t believe this is happening. Rew ...
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Tara and Alexis: Walking Tall
As a mother of a 5 year old with Ulcerative Colitis, you would not believe just how many times I have heard people tell me “I don’t think I could do what you do, you are such a strong Mother.” But the thing is, it’s not strength and it’s not exactly like I had a [...]
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Karen’s Story: I’ll keep on running
“Challenges are what makes life interesting, Overcoming them is what makes life meaningful.” When I was 23 years old, I was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis. The next decade was an incredibly painful struggle for me. My condition caused to experience extreme anemia, fatigue, pain, and ...
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Shalana’s Story: There IS Light at the End of the Tunnel
In 2004 at the age of 17 I was diagnosed with a severe case of Crohn’s-Colitis. After gut wrenching pain and major weight loss, fevers, a blockage, fistulas,emergency surgeries, having my large intestine and rectum removed, infections, 60 pounds of fluid gain, Anemia, medicati ...
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Coming out of the IBD closet
I was diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitis in May of 2009…approximately 3 weeks before a 1200 mile road trip that I had planned months earlier. This trip was a reunion with some of my favorite friends and I was going to do all of the driving with my boyfriend. Oh did I mention we had pl ...
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Kirbi’s Advice for Parents of a Child with IBD
Kirbi was diagnosed with Crohn’s Disease at age 10. She later had a resection in 2009. Kirbi is now attending Kendall College for Art and Design for illustration. Check out her art work on her website Kirbi Fagan Illustrations. Kirbi is a great example of a child who was sick but has ...
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Charis’s My “Screw It” Moment
I’ve always been a VERY open person. I took pleasure in seeing what kinds of conversations would gross my co-workers out the most (particularly at lunch time), never held back when describing what sort of virus I had (and the color and texture of the phlegm associated with it), and o ...
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Brenna’s Story: I know I can do anything when I put my mind to it
My name is Brenna. I am almost ten years old. When I was seven, I woke up one day with stomachaches and bloody poop. After my doctor sent me to a pediatric gastroenterologist, he suggested a colonoscopy. That was the first time I had anesthesia, and it smelled really bad. That is how I was ...
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Bella’s Story: How I lost and found myself after being diagnosed with UC.
Hi everyone! Let me introduce myself, my name is Bella, and I am 24 years old. I was diagnosed with UC in 2007 right on my 19th birthday. I went from being a healthy, happy, bubbly, energetic, athlete college student, to being suddenly very ill basically over night. At first the medication ...
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The Weight of Sickness
Yup, thats me. That is the face that I wore during the first 2 years of my sickness. That is a face that has been created by high dose prednisone, late night eating and depression. That is the face of a UC flare. I’m sure you guys know that face, and I’m sure many of [...]
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Lauren Baker’s story: How a simple dress gave back my self-confidence.
If you are a twenty-something chick like me, then you are bound to have a few insecurities when it comes to your body. I have yet to meet a woman my age (or any age, for that matter) who is completely, 100 percent, okay with their body. Even the most fit women grab their thighs [...]
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Megan’s Story: When the Little Things Make A Big Difference
My college campus wasn’t very big. It only took 10 minutes to walk across the entire thing, and less to go from class to class. But even so, I remember running out of one class to use the nearest bathroom, and walking, defeated, to the next building for my next class, just to have th ...
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Lauren’s Story: When Giving Up a Dream Really is the Best Thing
I became a runner almost immediately after being diagnosed with ulcerative colitis. For some reason, despite the blood loss, the anemia, emaciated body and new diagnosis, my disease didn’t strike me as serious at first. It was no different than chicken pox or strep throat. Okay, sure, I� ...
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Charis’ Interview With Adam from IHaveUC.com
Introduction: My name is Charis Kirk. I’m 31 years old and I have a permanent ileostomy as a result of severe ulcerative colitis. I’m very straight-forward and I believe strongly in providing a realistic, yet optimistic, point of view on my IBD and ostomy experiences. So far I’ve had ...
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Lizz’s Story: Confidence Lost and Gained
IBD is not genenerally considered a sexy disease. People don’t want to talk about how many times a day they poop, the consistency of their poop, or the amount of blood in said poop. Mostly, ‘cause it’s not sexy. It’s not empowering. It’s private, and society tells us, it’s emba ...
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Jackie
Hi I’m Jackie. The quick version of my story is that I was diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitis in 2009, I had my colon removed in 2010, and my Jpouch connected in 2011. My UC resulted in many surgeries and complications along the way. During this time I felt alone, exhausted, and seriously ...
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Charis
Hi, I’m Charis. I was diagnosed with mild to moderate Ulcerative Colitis in May of 2009 and by October 2009 UC had spread throughout my entire colon. While I was in the hospital, my doctors realized that my colon was expanding quickly and I was faced with Toxic Megacolon. I had an em ...
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Meet some Girls With Guts
What happens when 5 girls from across the country meet up to talk about IBD? Girls with Guts 2012 happens!
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