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Own Your Crohn's

Empowering the Chronically Ill & Disabled to Lead Fuller Lives

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  • acceptance,  advocacy,  awareness,  Colorectal Surgery,  Crohn's,  living with IBD,  Mental Health,  Minority Health,  Ostomy,  Ulcerative Colitis,  Women's Health

    ~OYC Trailblazers~ Mollie’s Story: Living la Vida Latina with Ulcerative Colitis & an Ostomy

    September 27, 2019

    By Mollie Tinnin My journey with chronic illness began my senior year of high school after a violent assault left me hospitalized with life-threatening injuries. At the time, I received eight units of blood and during the treatment of the injuries I had sustained, the physicians discovered I had ulcers in my intestines. The treatment of both these injuries and my ulcerative colitis have been complicated in that they both are intertwined and affect each other even until this day. I’ve tried several medications, such as Mesalamine, but with the scar tissue and the ulcers both being in the same location, medication has not been very effective for me. Surgically,…

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    Tina Aswani Omprakash

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    Accepting My Crohn’s Disease to Finally Become Me

    January 15, 2024

    Brown Girl with Guts: Tina’s Journey with Crohn’s Disease

    April 30, 2019

    Day on the Hill 2019: The Faces of IBD Legislation

    May 11, 2019
  • acceptance,  awareness,  Body Positivity,  Colorectal Surgery,  coping with flares,  Crohn's,  Dating & Relationships,  Egg-Freezing,  J-Pouch,  living with IBD,  Ostomy,  Pregnancy in IBD,  Ulcerative Colitis,  Women's Health

    ~OYC TRAILBLAZERS~ Katie’s Story: Baby-Making Prospects & Egg-Freezing with a J-Pouch

    September 4, 2019

    A Nursing Student Tells OYC Her J-Pouch Story and How That Led to Her Courageous Decision to Freeze Her Eggs to Someday Have Children. By Katie Gene Friedman When I was first diagnosed with ulcerative colitis in my senior year of college, my colitis responded to medication and didn’t take up much of my life. Consequently, I only disclosed my diagnosis to my then boyfriend, best friend, and immediate family. During a bad flare and particularly stressful semester in grad school studying social psychology, that group expanded to include the nucleus of my social circle and some professors. At that point, my disease affected what I was doing but not…

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    Tina Aswani Omprakash

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    Metamorphosis

    August 13, 2018

    No More Secrets: An enlightening film that reveals the stigma of having an ostomy in India

    September 24, 2018

    Accepting My Crohn’s Disease to Finally Become Me

    January 15, 2024
  • advocacy,  awareness,  Body Positivity,  coping with flares,  Crohn's,  Diet,  J-Pouch,  living with IBD,  Ostomy,  Pelvic Floor Dysfunction,  Self-image,  Ulcerative Colitis,  Women's Health

    Weekend Long IBD Retreat Helped Me to Own My Crohn’s

    August 24, 2019

    Everyday Health blogger Tina Aswani Omprakash details her experience on a weekend-long retreat for women living with IBDs.

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    Tina Aswani Omprakash

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    IBD Awareness Week Line-Up: Diversity, Mental Health & More!

    December 1, 2018

    OYC Trailblazers: An Ode to My Father & Fellow IBD Warrior

    January 30, 2019

    Clinical Trials: The Next Frontier for Diverse Populations of IBD Patients

    July 31, 2019
  • awareness,  Colorectal Surgery,  coping with flares,  Crohn's,  Fistulizing Disease,  Irritable Bowel Syndrome,  living with IBD,  Pelvic Floor Dysfunction,  Pelvic pain,  stigma,  Ulcerative Colitis,  Women's Health

    Pelvic Pain in IBD: An Overlooked Complication

    August 9, 2019

    By Tina Aswani Omprakash, Medically Reviewed by Jenny Blair, MD Originally Published by Oshi Health, Inc., on August 8th, 2019 A complication of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) that often goes unaddressed and misdiagnosed is chronic pelvic pain (CPP). CPP is often defined as pain in the pelvic area that isn’t cyclic and isn’t related to pregnancy and that lasts for three to six months. It may affect from 6% to 25% of reproductive-age women, depending on how it’s defined, as well as men and older women. The condition can arise from a variety of causes. How I’ve Experienced Pelvic Pain So how does CPP apply to us as IBD patients?…

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    Tina Aswani Omprakash

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    ~OYC Trailblazers~ Anisha Zumba-ing Her Way into 2021!

    January 28, 2021

    The Value of Support Groups

    August 26, 2018

    Real Talk About Fistulae

    January 19, 2019
  • Ableism,  acceptance,  advocacy,  awareness,  caregivers,  Colorectal Surgery,  Crohn's,  Dating & Relationships,  Disability Justice,  Fistulizing Disease,  living with IBD,  Ostomy,  stigma,  Ulcerative Colitis,  Women's Health

    Love Knows No Disability

    July 2, 2019

    Nine years ago today, the love of my life, Anand, and I were married in a beautiful Hindu temple with several of our relatives and friends in attendance from all over the world. It was a momentous occasion for me not just in a traditional sense but because of how close I had been to death just two years prior. But as beautiful as the wedding was, the process of getting married wasn’t exactly a fairytale or a bed of roses. You see, a couple years prior, I was freed of an extremely warped and diseased colon on the 4th of July, 2008 (see blog post: My Very Own Independence…

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    Tina Aswani Omprakash

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    What Will People Think? ~A Short Documentary by Chealynn Feaster

    December 27, 2019

    University Accommodations in the COVID-19 Era

    September 7, 2020

    I am NOT a Burden: A South Asian Perspective

    July 1, 2020
  • acceptance,  awareness,  Colorectal Surgery,  coping with flares,  Crohn's,  living with IBD,  Mental Health,  PTSD,  Stigma,  Ulcerative Colitis,  Women's Health

    World PTSD Day 2019: The Faceless Woman

    June 27, 2019

    In honor of World PTSD Day today, I release a poem I wrote some weeks ago surrounding the medical trauma I’ve faced as a Crohn’s patient. This poem is not for the faint of heart so I will not be offended if you cannot read it. Post-traumatic stress is a term that’s often thrown around lightly but it has serious implications for people who have been in battle for their country, for their lives and against chronic illnesses. Everyday is a minefield with an array of flashbacks and memories that keep us from living our best lives. I urge you all to learn more and to respond to those who…

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    Tina Aswani Omprakash

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    Edgar Flores opens up about surviving near-death and the challenges of living with an ostomy in Mexico

    November 4, 2018

    Indian Ostomate Podcast Show: Episode 1 with Tina Aswani Omprakash

    July 23, 2020

    The Waiting Game

    June 30, 2018
  • advocacy,  awareness,  Colorectal Surgery,  Crohn's,  Fistulizing Disease,  J-Pouch,  living with IBD,  Ostomy,  Ulcerative Colitis,  Women's Health

    J-Pouch Failure – Tina’s Story

    June 15, 2019

    Originally published by Amber of Colitis Ninja on June 12, 2019: https://colitisninja.com/2019/06/j-pouch-failure-tinas-story/ J-POUCH TAKEDOWN ANNIVERSARY Next month is my 5 year takedown anniversary for my j-pouch. I have stated many times that the j-pouch has a 94-96% success rate. But you don’t hear many success stories on the internet because most of them are out there living their lives and not boasting about it on the internet. Because you don’t hear a majority of the success stories out there, I feel compelled to keep sharing my own story of life with a j-pouch.  SUCCESS & FAILURE STORIES I have given a lot of thought to how I would address this year’s takedown anniversary. I thought…

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    Tina Aswani Omprakash

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    ~OYC Trailblazers~ Mollie’s Story: Living la Vida Latina with Ulcerative Colitis & an Ostomy

    September 27, 2019

    How a clinical trial helped this Crohn’s advocate finally reach remission

    November 24, 2019

    TINA ASWANI OMPRAKASH | 2018 NYC ADULT HONORED HERO

    April 20, 2018
  • acceptance,  advocacy,  awareness,  coping with flares,  Crohn's,  living with IBD,  Mental Health,  stigma,  Ulcerative Colitis,  Women's Health

    I’m Chronically Ill & Depressed; So What?

    June 3, 2019

    You might be looking at this photo and thinking, “Oh, Tina looks like she’s having a great time enjoying beautiful weather in the park.” Can you tell an hour before this photo was taken, hubs struggled to get me to leave our home? Can you tell I had been curled up in bed crying? Can you tell it was next to impossible for me to get myself ready and out of bed that afternoon? NOPE. The truth is photos on social media and the Internet, in general, can be so deceiving. What you see here is a woman with Crohn’s and 37520572 other ailments smiling in a park because that’s…

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    Tina Aswani Omprakash

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    Basmah’s Journey: The Cultural Impacts of Being an Egyptian Crohnie

    April 18, 2021

    ~OYC TRAILBLAZERS~ Katie’s Story: Baby-Making Prospects & Egg-Freezing with a J-Pouch

    September 4, 2019

    As a Chronically-Ill Brown Woman, Here’s Why I Share My Survival Story

    May 16, 2019
  • acceptance,  awareness,  Body Positivity,  Colorectal Surgery,  Crohn's,  Fistulizing Disease,  living with IBD,  Mental Health,  Ostomy,  Self-image,  Ulcerative Colitis,  Women's Health,  World IBD Day

    Why My IBD Scars Make Me Proud

    May 23, 2019

    How I learned to love what once made me shudder. By Tina Aswani Omprakash Originally published by Everyday Health on 5/17/2019: https://www.everydayhealth.com/columns/my-health-story/why-my-ibd-scars-make-me-proud/ This year’s World IBD Day theme is “Making the Invisible Visible,” and I’ve been taking a long hard look at what that means to me. The reality is that living with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) has meant donning an invisibility cloak for most of my adult life. But over the past 14 months, I’ve striven to make my invisible illness visible. From sharing my story widely on social media to using my platform to educate others on how IBD wreaks havoc on patients like me, I’ve come to realize that visibility is necessary for…

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    Tina Aswani Omprakash

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    Ostomy Awareness Day: Empowering Ostomates to Live Fuller Lives

    November 22, 2019

    ~OYC Trailblazers~ Anisha Zumba-ing Her Way into 2021!

    January 28, 2021

    Indian Ostomate Podcast Show: Episode 1 with Tina Aswani Omprakash

    July 23, 2020
  • advocacy,  awareness,  Colorectal Surgery,  Crohn's,  Emerging Therapies,  Fistulizing Disease,  living with IBD,  Ostomy,  Ulcerative Colitis,  Women's Health

    Fistulas: What You Need to Know About a Common Side Effect of Crohn’s

    May 17, 2019

    By Padma Nagappan Medically Reviewed by Kareem Sassi, MD Originally published by Everyday Health on May 14th, 2019: https://www.everydayhealth.com/crohns-disease/symptoms/fistulas-common-crohns-side-effect-you-should-aware/ Fistulas are an abnormal connection between two body parts. In Crohn’s patients they form as tunnels within the walls of the intestine and connect to other organs or tissue, causing pain and infection. After years of living in intense pain and going through several misdiagnoses, Tina Aswani Omprakash, found out she had Crohn’s disease. Her condition was so severe that she needed emergency proctocolectomy surgery (removal of the colon and rectum), and she was put on biologics. “I knew Crohn’s was an intense disease, but I did not realize what it takes to really, truly fight…

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    Tina Aswani Omprakash

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    Inspire’s #KeepUsAllSafe COVID-19 Campaign

    April 12, 2020

    Accepting My Crohn’s Disease to Finally Become Me

    January 15, 2024

    A Valentine’s Day Special: Dating & Relationships with an Ostomy

    February 25, 2020
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Recent Posts

  • Feb 18, 2025 How to Own Your Crohn’s & Ostomy While Traveling to India
  • Jan 05, 2025 Key Takeaways from Advances in IBD (AIBD) 2024
  • Dec 05, 2024 Navigating Mental Health in Crohn’s Disease 
  • Dec 04, 2024 Highlights from ACG 2024: SAIA’s IBDesis’ Patient Experience
  • Nov 18, 2024 SAIA is proud to announce Tina Aswani-Omprakash, MPH as our full-time CEO!

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