Some people are lucky enough to never have a major illness or get a broken bone their whole life. Others, like myself, are not as lucky. I understand that many people fight life-threatening illnesses every day like cancer or heart disease, but being told you have to live with an illness for life is also a battle. For me, that battle is migraines.

I was told in the 7th grade I would struggle with this. Back then it didn't seem like that big of a deal. Then my sophomore year of high school hit and I missed 20 days of school. Junior year, I missed 22 and then my senior year I missed a whopping 42 days of school. My illness was taking over my life. Not only was I missing out on my education, I was also missing out on extracurricular activities and my social life. Instead of going out with my friends and family, I spent most of my time in my bed, asleep with my head pounding. I then started losing a lot of weight and became very ill. After many hospital visits and medicines later, I had to ask myself, am I going to let this illness control me or am I going to control it?

It's hard fighting your own body. It's even harder when your peers don't understand what you're going through. I can't tell you how many times people told me "it's just a migraine, power through it" or "you're just babying it, you could come to school". I got to a point where my parents were afraid I wasn't going to be able to make it through college because I was getting migraines so frequently. I had to dig myself out of a hole that I never planned on falling into.

Reflecting back on those 3 years now, I wouldn't change what I went through. I had to be strong for myself and at the time that wasn't something I was used to doing. It taught me that it's okay to put myself first and to focus on myself for a little while, especially when you need it. Most importantly, it taught me that I am stronger than I give myself credit for. I learned to not listen to what others think. Besides, they're not in my shoes so why should their opinion matter? I now understand that life is going to knock you down more times than you prefer, but it's up to you whether you get back up or not.

Now, whenever I get a migraine I just shrug it off and let it pass and when life wants to through things my way, I know I can handle it because I've handled much worse. It's hard talking about something I tried for so hard to hide from everyone, but I've accepted that this is apart of my life and something I have to deal with. If you have an illness or are going through a rough time, know that it gets better. You'll learn your body and figure out how to manage it. Just like everything else in life, you have to be patient.