It started when I was 22. I never had any digestive issues up until one morning when I woke up to a strong urge to run the bathroom… went 30 times that day. Then the day after, I woke up with TWO hemorrhoids. And then every single day after that, I was just going to the bathroom between 10-30 times a day, all diarrhea. But that was really my only symptom (along with the hemorrhoids). Then 3 months later, I developed a perianal abscess… then a fistula… and so now I’m 25 and only got diagnosed months ago.

But, I always found it so bizarre how literally I went to sleep one night with no digestive issues and then the next day I woke up with Crohns symptoms. Even when I went to the CRS after the abscess, he even said it sounded like I had a stomach bug or a parasite or bacteria or something like that (I thought so too because of how sudden it was). But then all those tests can back negative. And then I went to a regular doctor in March and she thought I just had IBS. I went to a Gastro in May and she also thought I just had IBS. But then I went to a different CRS and they told me for sure it’s Crohns and they were surprised that the other doctors didn’t recognize the obvious symptoms.