What Has AS Taught You About the World?

Hillary Wool of Brooklyn, NY, describes the way having ankylosing spondylitis has opened her eyes to certain social and racial inequities, and how the disease has taught her to live every day with gratitude.

I think it's important for people with chronic conditions and disabilities to work in that space advocating for people who do not have access to healthcare that they should.

Interviewer: What AS taught you about the world?

That's a really good question. I think AS, I'm just going through this onset of, these life-changing chronic conditions, has definitely illustrated for me, like your life can materially change literally overnight. The implication of that for me is living with gratitude for the experiences that you have at present, having that gratitude for the experiences you've had before, because circumstances can absolutely change.

I think it's definitely opened my eyes to new layers, or layers that I didn't have that direct exposure to in terms of just the inequities that exist within the U.S. I know that doctors look differently at me than they would if I were Black, or if I lived somewhere else. Thinking about even as someone with a massive amount of privilege on many levels, how challenging it was and how challenging it has been to find the right treatments, to be believed at certain points, and not doubted or not questioned. Thinking about the thousands and thousands of people who have chronic conditions in the U.S. who are just not going to get access to the same kind of care and not have the same kind of outcomes.