The onset of chronic illness is rarely courteous, but for Judy Batalion, it arrived with theatrical cruelty. It happened completely out of nowhere during a family trip to New York City to celebrate New Year’s Eve in Times Square. Standing out on the Statue of Liberty’s crown, she sipped the extravagantly priced hot chocolate her parents had bought her to combat the bitter winter cold, gazing in awe at the dazzling metropolis below. Suddenly, she was overcome by a wave of intense nausea. That very night, the symptoms escalated aggressively. She began vomiting, making frantic runs to the toilet, and developed a high fever. Instead of witnessing the festive celebrations, she could not even make it to the window to see the iconic ball drop.
What followed was a harrowing three-year medical odyssey that transformed her adolescence. Batalion spent the majority of her time shuttling between doctor’s offices and bathrooms, plagued by relentless bloating, constipation, diarrhea, and severe bleeding. The pain was excruciating, characterized mostly by searing pangs that struck with terrifying unpredictability. Her medical schedule became a grueling carousel of diagnostic procedures: X-rays, scopes, breath tests, and physical exams. She tried various medications, carbon supplements, and acupuncture in desperate bids for relief. Steroids worked miraculously at first, before losing their efficacy entirely, while experimental drugs passed straight through her digestive system completely undigested. Her condition deteriorated to the point where she began to evacuate the lining of her own colon, which she vividly recalled looking like a thin white snake. Her blood count dropped so precipitously that she was repeatedly hospitalized for emergency blood transfusions and iron infusions. It became glaringly apparent that she was suffering from an exceptionally severe case of ulcerative colitis.
During this tumultuous period, Batalion was navigating the already treacherous waters of seventh through tenth grade—a phase of life typically defined by first loves, frenemies, experimental tattoos, and driver’s education classes. However, as an adolescent grappling with acute bowel disease, her teenage world shrank dramatically. When peers offered rides home, she had to decline, terrified that a driver might take detours and keep her away from a restroom. The metro system became a source of genuine anxiety; she constantly worried about what might happen if a train stalled and she found herself trapped underground. She managed to attend school, but strategically positioned herself right next to the classroom door for a quick exit. Social engagements, such as boy-girl get-togethers, were largely out of the question. She could not even sit through a movie in a friend’s basement, paralyzed by the logistical nightmare of proximity to a bathroom and the impossibly high risk of public embarrassment. Consequently, she stopped attending most social events entirely.
The psychological toll mirrored the physical devastation. While all teenagers deal with bodies that are changing and seemingly out of their control, Batalion’s body felt as though it was waging an active war against her, emitting shameful sounds, smells, and sights entirely without her consent. It felt as though "Little Judy"—her authentic self—was buried somewhere deep inside a morass of sickly flesh, reduced to an anatomical puzzle for ancient-seeming doctors to probe and decipher. Guilt compounded her suffering: had she somehow caused this? Was it her fault? She did not merely fail to love her body; she actively hated it.
When her peers began exploring their developing sexuality, Batalion recoiled. For one, it is profoundly difficult to contemplate romance when doubled over in physical anguish. Having been constantly exposed to the clinical, detached environment of the medical world, she had erected formidable psychological barriers, effectively dissociating from her own physical experience. Moreover, sharing her daily reality with anyone seemed an impossible feat. While her classmates worried about algebra tests, Batalion worried about blood tests. While her friends gossiped about experimenting with drugs, she was already taking more pharmaceutical medications than half the school combined. When doctors casually mentioned the terrifying possibility of developing cancer, the isolation deepened. She felt profoundly misunderstood, completely alone, and exceedingly ugly, lacking any framework to let another person get close.
By the time she reached the tenth grade, her life was entirely consumed by her illness. It was at this critical juncture that surgery was formally introduced as an option—and a major surgery at that. The proposed procedure involved removing her entire large intestine and constructing a specialized pouch from a section of her small intestine that would ideally function as a de facto colon. Although medical professionals repeatedly postponed the procedure out of concern for the immense surgical risks, Batalion insisted on moving forward. She made her resolve clear to her parents, telling them that if they refused to drive her to the hospital, she would take the public bus.
Consequently, at the age of 15, Batalion underwent the radical surgery to remove her entire colon. The resulting internal pouch proved to be transformative. While she was never going to be a conventional "bowel normie" and could no longer eat with absolute abandon, the operation afforded her a mostly pain-free existence. She maintained relatively good health throughout her twenties, eventually venturing into dating and enthusiastically making up for lost time. At age 31, she married a man to whom she was finally able to open up completely about her chronic condition—someone who was even willing to support her extensive toilet paper consumption. Yet, this milestone ushered in a complex new set of questions. Was her body robust enough to carry a pregnancy? Could she move past a lifetime of shame and corporeal disappointment to create new life? Furthermore, should she even become a parent, considering the risk that her children might inherit similar health struggles? She wrestled with these heavy doubts for two years.
The internal debate came to an abrupt halt the moment she decided she might finally be ready to try for a family. Her gynecologist promptly enrolled her in a fertility clinic, issuing a stark warning that individuals with her surgical history frequently encounter severe complications and that there was not a minute to waste. Just a few weeks later, she visited her local clinic for routine bloodwork so the results could be forwarded to the specialized fertility center. To her utter astonishment, as a squealing nurse revealed upon reviewing the paperwork, she was already pregnant.
The subsequent nine months passed remarkably smoothly from a gastrointestinal standpoint, save for some excruciating bouts of gas trapped painfully beneath her expanding belly. Her first daughter was born healthy via a scheduled Caesarean section—a delivery method strongly recommended because natural childbirth carried a significant risk of damaging her internal pouch. Although she later faced a dangerous and frightening ectopic pregnancy a few years down the line while trying for a second child, likely caused by scar tissue from her historical surgeries, she ultimately welcomed three children. Looking back, she views this outcome as both miraculous and slightly insane. Her body, which had once been a disintegrating, diseased collection of failing organs, had somehow generated abundant life. Eschewing years of traditional yoga and pilates, she finally felt truly strong, and for the first time, even a little bit beautiful.
Judy Batalion is a New York Times bestselling author of award-winning nonfiction and fiction. Her essays have appeared in prominent publications including The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Vogue, among others. Holding a Bachelor of Arts in the History of Science from Harvard University and a PhD from the University of London, Batalion has previously worked as a museum curator and university lecturer. She currently resides in New York City with her husband and three children.