Ulcerative Colitis: How Your Home Can Fit into Your Life

As I said when I wrote about what to look for in an apartment as an ulcerative colitis sufferer, I made about every mistake in the book so I was much more prepared when it came to buying a home.

The first thing I knew was that with my ulcerative colitis I did not want a lot of outdoor house maintenance so my wife and I bought a house that had aluminum siding. Further, while the house was a two-story house, it had two bathrooms on the first floor and one on the second floor. We got a house that had three bedrooms, a living room, a den, a kitchen and a large family room. It was important to me to have "space" and privacy for those times when I was cramping.

Also, with respect to my ulcerative colitis, I did enjoy relaxing while working in the yard and the exercise was good for me so we also opted for a bigger yard. That also allowed my wife and I to "garden" which we enjoyed doing.

The trickiest part to purchasing a house and having ulcerative colitis was to find a house that was in a quiet, "non-stress inducing" neighborhood and yet be reasonably close to work and be on some type of commercial transportation route.

In regards to that, my wife and I had to make a decision about what was more important and we decided it was better for both of us if we lived in a quiet, "safe" neighborhood so we lived out "a ways". That eliminated a lot of nervousness on our part and minimized ulcerative colitis flares due to stress. However, there was still the problem of what to do if I got sick at work and didn't feel good enough as a result of an ulcerative colitis problem to get myself home and, my wife couldn't get me.

What we did was to examine the locale of several downtown hotels close to the office that I could get to quickly on foot if I felt an ulcerative colitis problem coming on. Further, after talking with my boss, it turned out there was an additional restroom on the next floor up in our office building; it was a floor that was unoccupied.

Finally I did have a close friend who actually offered his apartment as a temporary "emergency stop" should I have an ulcerative colitis flare.

For me, as an ulcerative colitis sufferer, the answer as to what type of house to buy depended on a good safe and quiet location; it included having plenty of space; it included having no outside maintenance; it included finding temporary emergency measures and, it included having a big yard.

Later, as we had children, we got a larger master bedroom for privacy from the kids but the first house was always special to me.