Dealing with IBS in college

celesteroberts
Thu, 27 Feb 2014 22:59:19 +0000

You need to register with your university’s disabilities services office as soon as you know where you will attend . They will have forms for you and your doctor to fill out. Once that is done you meet with them to discuss what kind of accommodations are necessary. My daughter gets a room with a private bath. She has the option to take tests at the testing center with clock stopped if needs to use bathroom, though she has not used that option. Since she has a case file with disability services, if she needs to miss classes on a bad day, the office will verify to profs that she is actually ill and not just skipping class. Depending on your illness and your school, you might request other accommodations, like priority scheduling to get into later day sections if the illness is worse in the morning. Or permission to live off campus if you are sensitive to prepared foods and need to have a kitchen and cook. My daughter lives on campus with a meal plan because she doesn’t want to bother with cooking, but her symptoms are much less when she is eating simple non-processed foods at home. I don’t what it is exactly that triggers things, but processed food plays a part. Knowing that the support is there for you at school tends to relieve the anxiety a bit so that symptoms are not as bad as they might otherwise be. My daughter went far away despite the IBS/anxiety concerns. Things would have been easier if she stayed here, but she wanted to go away.