INSIDE/OUT: My Battle With IBD (Full Documentary) | Rebecca Zamolo

[Music] running for me is therapeutic it's my time for me to connect with myself it's the only time that I'm able to disconnect from everything and just really be with myself [Music] hi I'm Rebecca Zuma lo I'm from Northern California I'm the oldest of five kids she appointed herself in charge so she was always mothering the other kids I was definitely the bossy one I would choreograph routines for everyone I would yell at my siblings if like they did something wrong I started doing acrobatic gymnastics and I competed and I went to Nationals when I was nine and then I turned over to artistic [Music] as she grew into herself she organized musicals plays skits I thought I wanted to act or do some type of performing and I went to school for sports broadcasting I didn't necessarily love school thank God I ran track in college cuz that kind of kept me in line for school what I really wanted to do was act and perform and so I just decided I was gonna go for what I really wanted to do rather than like just do what is the safe the safe bet we met a long time ago about 12 years ago I was a I was a singer and she was actually a dancer so I met Matt when I was a professional cheerleader for the San Jose SaberCats and that was in a boy band and they were doing a music video for MTV and I was one of the six cheerleaders picked for his music video we hit it off right there on set and then the after party the wrap party he was like his first line to me was like you run track I used to run track and I was like okay some of those people that like everybody's gravitated to easy to talk to you but she also was very down-to-earth and likes to have a lot of fun and it's kind of hard to go somewhere where somebody's not like gravitated to come and talk to her today I try to make it as a solo artist and just one thing after another kept on stopping me from moving forward with that he had gotten into the hotel business and we both kind of decided well I decided I was like I'm moving to LA you know and he was pretty excited to move to we decided to take the next step and move in together and move down the Los Angeles so I moved to LA to become an actress like many do [Music] I'm gonna run out golf course like the long way and then I will go up to 26 bathroom because I always stop there I remember I went for a run one day and all of a sudden I was like oh I have to run to the bathroom when I like ran back went to the bathroom and then went on again and I went to the bathroom like three times when her stomach started acting up and we really didn't know what was going on she would call me from work late at night like hey can you take me to the hospital I can't stay in this pain I don't know what's going on [Music] so this is the 76 gas station that I I stopped at at least once every time I run and she used to come in and I was always wondering try to figure out what was going on and they really didn't know anything then they kept on having him do all these cats games they sent me in for a sigmoidoscopy and that's where I found out like I had all sort of colitis it was heart we didn't really know anything about it and didn't really there wasn't like a lot of information out there so also colitis is a disease that involves mainly the colon and rectum and it basically is an ulcerative colitis which means that at the mucosa that lined the entire colon rectum are inflamed and that leads to sin such as diarrhea bleeding you know a year into it things weren't getting better I would be like driving home and all of a sudden I would like have to go and I remember like I'd have to pull into the Parmen I'd be like man come here to get the car and he'd have to get in my car and I have to run up to the like just to like get to the bathroom and time this disease had like almost like made a prison for me you know or I had to eat at a certain time so that I could leave at a certain time so that I could go somewhere you know like everything was basically around my worked around my stomach I probably go to the bathroom you know 20 20 plus times a day I don't get nutrients you know my body doesn't absorb a lot of things so I'm constantly anemic I god we really tried to to figure out okay hey there's a Disick yer we can go ahead and try to figure out how to do this and they kept on giving her medicine after medicine after medicine and nothing was working I've had to take like every medication possible I listen you know at first I would listen to these doctors and they'd be like you know don't eat like low fiber foods this and that which actually made my stomach worse so I've been in the hospital every three months eventually just got to that point where surgery was necessary [Music] you know every year that passed was like another you know my risk of colon cancer was getting higher and higher and higher we hadn't met with this new surgeon and he just kind of wanted to talk to us by the time I met her I think she's one of those people she was in the field that you know she's young having surgery is not something that people ever think about being sick is not something people think about that age group so she's doing her best really to avoid surgery they were recommending getting my colon removed or part of it removed and then carrying a bag so in your case the the surgery we're planning to do is to remove the entire colon including the rectum we're gonna take your small intestine and bring it up to the right side to divert it you permit temporary masks that that'll be what you see here this I almost don't I was like I don't I don't want surgery it's like hi I'm here for the lead role though the marking will be on the right side right for the alias Emmys I'm gonna mark you two areas one above the belly button one below typically it's it could either be oval shaped or round shaped and it'll be here literally like kind of like that some patients like to our kind of flowy you know slowly shirts that you can't even say you can tell and this one you can kind of tuck in your pants if you wear like yoga pants ER but these are guts yeah so it's part of yeah do we arise you're what she put a bag up on me and I was like oh my god it was it was tough like it was like whoa like this body will never be the same again you know it made me sad but also like felt I felt like a little at peace like knowing that like this was the right decision so how are you feeling yeah talking to my surgeon and hearing that like I was the most severe case that they've had it you know over two years I wonder upbeat talk to you little bit on the phone after your last colonoscopy the doctor Tommy did mention that things look really severe the colitis and I called you talking about how that may alter our plan now the final planning we're still gonna go in with idea of doing that we're doing the operation if we find the colitis is really you know severe and that it's a higher risk to do the procedure now where we do everything in one girl we may just choose to stage it out and that's some people really know only at the time when we do the operation on Thursday three months or nine months depending on how how much damage is inside there still even that risk that they go in and I have to have a bag for the rest of my life worst-case scenario when something like infection develops early it can be life-threatening you could have a blood clot to your legs these are all again worst-case scenarios where but we really won't know until I'm under the knife but you know like there's just all these unknowns and question marks and that's like the scary part you're confident in the surgery yeah this is absolutely me I think you're one of the worst ones in terms of symptoms already be trying to hold off on it for a while yeah you've been suffering for 20 bones today so this is absolutely yeah cut like to see the other sign and be like wow I could like be normal or they're like you might go to the bathroom five times a day I'm like five times a day that's amazing like I can't even remember that I've been like fighting surgery for a long time yeah we'll take good care of you this disease has really made my life a prison and I feel like I'm such this like free happy person and you know I try to be that but I feel like I've lost a lot of like Who I am from this and I can't really fully be me because I'm constantly like worrying about this like there's there's moments in my day you know where I'm me for like 15 minutes or an hour I'm on you know performing and I forget but then like the reality is that like I can't you know beat me and I'm looking for a looking forward to a nice little hole stoma and that's it yeah the night before my surgery I wanted to have a party with all my friends just the people that have supported me along the way that have really been there for me you know I did my Kickstarter to raise money for this it was just so good to see all the the love and support that I had from these these people tomorrow is my surgery uh obviously we don't know what's gonna happen I think having the everybody come over the night before really just really calmed it down a little bit give her a little bit of peace I didn't do much my mom came down and you know when your mom's here you always feel you turn back into that little baby so I just can't make her better and it's hard to see her kids suffer I know I have a lot of people praying for me and that means like so much because at this point it really is you know in God's hands because you know there's only so much doctor scheduler so yeah we'll see how it goes and hopefully hopefully it goes well [Music] so it is five o'clock on Thursday September 11th I'm about to head over for my surgery so Rebecca her mom and I I went to the hospital and got her checked in I'm just waiting for my surgery and that is for my sister this I'm holding it to the last second you can see she was pretty scared it was it was a little nerve-wracking you can't really do anything at that point that's too close and my husband just the trio wait for centuries about waking up I remember just a scene I guess seeing my fam I think I see it seemed that my mom and it's 2:15 I just got out of surgery and the first thing she says was no one will tell me is it three months or nine months and I had to break it to her you know then I was like I saw Matt he's like trying to be all cool he's like so no it's it's gonna be fine but it's gonna be okay and I was like drugged up I found out who cannot have that for nine months so for a lot of setting but given the fact that she's recently on high-dose steroids as well as a Remicade that long-term outcomes would be best if we actually break up the procedure so that she's able to get rid of the effects of the Remicade in the steroids that she's currently on I think she eventually found comfort and knowing that it was a successful surgery and no complications happen she's able to move forward with her life dastan ostomy doctor and he is showing me oh my God my stomach for the first time and it is freaking huge oh my god okay it was hard it was bigger than I thought it was uglier it was like this weird thing sticking out of me it's like a mushroom it's like big Botox lips you said it's Ward though it's good this wallet it's a normal reaction of the body to get so well yeah someone stuff your face is kind of swell but sooner or later is going to subside did anomaly yeah like I don't know how I can feel good wearing a bag but scared away I guess I had a - sounds like penis there like she's paid I'm like I am I didn't know I don't feel anything the day after surgery I my friends came they were all wearing team Rebecca shirts and you know they uh it gets me so emotional every time um to like have that many people show up for you and know that like they were rooting for you it's not like I planned any of this I wasn't able to so this was them making an effort no more Hospital for me the first week of having my bag it felt like I was just thrown into this bag boot camp last night was quite interesting I was actually I woke up and I noticed on my stomach that my bag was leaking it was just one thing after the other after the other and it was so right now my bag is leaking and I go to the doctor but I have to uh have to take uber I had to call an uber because my husband was at work I'm gonna try to figure out a duck wrapped I'll show you I put tape on my stomach and then oh it comes undone and it all comes down onto my carpet I guess the came undone um so like you can see so I'm literally cleaning up my own feces on my carpet the pain medication made me carsick I threw up in this bag right here luckily my uber driver Mauricio is very nice and I luckily didn't get on his car but he's still taking me to my appointment oh what a fun little day it's been so far I got out went to the dirt nurse and was just so relieved and she just like cleaned me up I remember just being like defeated you know completely defeated and and that takes you know a lot for me but man it was like the lowest of lows I am changing my bag right now which there's actually it was leaking so I had to use some hai tape so it wouldn't leak which that stuff works pretty good it's a new day we're gonna start fresh you know like you know how to change your bag now you'll be okay this was like really hard for me to look at like for a long time and it still kind of is but go clean all this gunk off yeah Matt's kind of does it once in a while but I mean I need to be able to do this like so I know you know I don't even know when I'm going to the bathroom just all of a sudden and it'll be like drop you know like oh my god which is why we have this year so this is how the stealth boat guy Richard told me to put it on is like that and then I push it down make sure it fits after a few weeks with the bag I I definitely had adjusted more what I really noticed is I could eat foods that I hadn't been able to eat in years and not have pain like I haven't done that I would have never I would have had to eat an hour and a half before and I would have like had to make sure I went to the bathroom right before I left and there's no way I could have just ate something right before and driven in a car and been okay it's probably soda anything carbonated like close it up so all these things that people think are so normal were like things that I was like I felt like a kid like I like experiencing like something for the first time again it was like oh my gosh like we get to walk home after dinner like wow you know and just little things that were so big to me going to a movie so I just finished watching my first movie but who's really sure right now and I ate and drank the whole time without having to leave god I'd missed out on so much of life for eight years you know like it's crazy to think what I went through you know and it was all because I was afraid of a surgery that has in fact given me my life back the first time I ran was so emotional that was the first time in eight years that in the first two minutes of my run I hadn't had to use the bathroom seven minutes in never done that I just like thank God you know that I can do this like what I was saying earlier the littlest things that people don't realize I'm just so grateful for [Music] it feels awesome it was weird cuz I've like run with pain and my stomach for so long like I forget what it's like to like run without it and like for the first time it's like I had no pain like I just felt so good I felt like I could run like a million miles I've been making myself do it for so many years in pain just because I that's why I started doing running in the first place and just feels like I have like something back that I did like warning for Simone [Music] so it's been a little over three weeks since my surgery and I'm finally feeling back to normal about a month after my surgery I felt stronger and better than I had felt in a long time and I I wanted a challenge I think I'm making the decision to go ahead and do the half marathon which is in November the reason I chose the Las Vegas half marathon is because it was for the Crohn's and Colitis foundation the CCFA part of me was just like are you serious like you just had surgery this is kind of like the time where you really need to focus on getting better I felt like I was trying to convince him and I know he was looking for the doctors approval before I started going for it the one thing we always say is waste a very well hydrate as the most important camper after these kinds of surgeries is because the colon this main job used to be the real job all the water so after you take it out you run the risk again dehydration I wanted to run not just for myself but for all the people you know couldn't let the lofty goal 13.1 miles it's not like a short distance it's gonna take some energy to get through that one thing people watch out for is a risk of a hernia after any kind of operation because the incisions only healed about 80% of their previous strength so there's always a risk of hernia anytime we make the decision for the abdomen so I had attempted a half marathon a couple years ago and I had to drop out because my pain was so bad at Mile seven I went to a bathroom and I basically didn't leave the port-a-potty I felt you knows it it was such a letdown to to have to stop and to not be able to finish physically not be able to finish she knows her body best it's gonna be interesting I just want to make sure if she's not like pushing too hard just to make sure that she could finish this race you know I really want her to get better I think what we finally agreed to is that if I felt like I couldn't do something or something was getting worse that I would stop and that was the best he could do with me because when I have my mind set on something I'm gonna do it whether he says yes or no you know I I don't it was gonna happen [Music] since the half-marathon was only a month away I knew I had to start training pretty fast I went for a run with Amy one day I met her through my husband they went to acting class together a couple years ago she's a force to reckon with I love her I think she's got amazing energy and zest about life she was just talking about the half marathon she was gonna run 13.1 miles for me and I'm just thinking in my head like you've never even run five miles I'm doing this marathon for her which I it's such a bad idea it really is but because I hate running and you're gonna do this half marathon for me it was at that point that I knew if my friends were there surrounding me and doing it with me and supporting me that I could do 13 [Music] I've started at one mile and I would build a mile every few days and I got up to mile four and I felt good and it got up to six and I felt good I was tired I felt out of shape but I felt good [Applause] fine line we gotta stop hope but then before I'd hit eight miles that's when I'd start to notice pain I went to the doctor and they couldn't really figure out what what was wrong I was running today and at Mile 7 I started like feeling pain and it felt like my like stoma was like getting pulled out of my stomach that was even more scary because it was kind of like I had to make that call like do I do I keep running or do I not I'd go back down and and run you know for miles and I'd be okay but every time I hit hit eight I don't know something in my body would cause pain and I I couldn't finish I tried to go for another run today and I had the same pressure around my stoma I felt like if I didn't finish the half marathon I would be letting so many people down including myself and I just couldn't see that as an option I'm gonna try to take it easy for the next couple days and see if it gets better right now it's it's it's like bleeding around the stoma and it's it's really tender so I'm hoping just taking a little bit of rest or will help am I just being stubborn is this something that I should really be doing or am i risking my help [Music] I can put it today we are putting on a fundraiser for the Crohn's and Colitis foundation it's called dancing for a Cause I figured since I was running the half marathon I might as well try to raise money for them I got a speaker to come and share her story after struggling for five years and really not and I also reached out to people with Crohn's and Colitis and a lot of people are embarrassed to talk about it in person so I picked a few stories and I had a couple of my friends read it out loud at the age of 13 he was rushed that's when he was officially diagnosed disease what these people go through what I went through you know it's it's such a internal struggle and no one really understands and I think these these honest letters that they had written really kind of gave people a glimpse into a world that not many people want to talk about [Music] the surgery because even though I lost my cool I hope it was cool because I had my stealth belt and my bag and I was just able to dance all the love that I had surrounded myself with throughout my my surgery throughout my recovery like that this date could help me get through this and I could run a half marathon so a couple days before Vegas I just wanted to just really clear my head the hike just kind of you know just centered me it helped me gather my thoughts it helped me just just appreciate how far I'd come I remember being like wow like less than two months ago you had surgery and you're gonna do this amazing thing and you're gonna inspire so many people you know and it was it was a powerful moment that I needed to have by myself [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] here we're halfway to Vegas I run the marathon tomorrow and I'm just road trippin with Jay and mad this is probably the first road trip that I have felt good on I was drinking coffee water juice like you name it I was drinking it and I was just so happy I remember we pulled off once to stop and it was because the guys had to use the bathroom a little nervous but I'm ready to run and finish 13.1 miles [Music] [Applause] [Music] once we got to Vegas I met up with the with team challenge they were who I was running for that for the CCFA we went and signed up at the convention center which is where everyone goes to get their you know they're racing bibs so I just got my big number I'm all set up for the race I got my t-shirt it's kind of pumps me up more because the energy is like so yeah just getting ready the morning of the half-marathon felt surreal I couldn't believe that this day had come the style lounge in Las Vegas had heard about my story and offered to give us tattoos and do our hair so all of us girls you know of course we like wanted to look cute the people that were running it with me was it was such an eclectic group ELISA and Christi Cosette Gina's a mom with three kids and Aimee is not a runner [Music] I got a henna tattoo on my hand they gave us angel wings on her back they did our hair we looked amazing I mean we were probably the best looking group of girls running a half marathon it just made the day that much more special and it added so much I think it really got all of us even more excited all right I am going to change my bag for the half marathon that I am running today so right before the race I wanted to make sure that I would have no leaks in my bag so I wanted to make sure it was a fresh bag I went back to my hotel room and I switched my bag I'm hoping that it works and there's no leaks because running with a leak Riki bags not gonna be a great thing there was the aspect of me physically running and then there was the aspect of the bag leaking and both were concerns I just hope the bag holds up it's kind of what I'm nervous about to be honest it's like my biggest fear it's more more so the bag leaking then me finishing even though I know that finish is gonna be art also we've all been leading up to this race I'm so excited two months ago I was in a hospital bed have my corner and now I'm going to be running a half marathon and that's pretty amazing though [Music] mclemore performed your jumping around and rapping and then you could just kind of see our faces going like and just like oh my gosh like we're just about we're about to run a half marathon like and then reality set in and we are like and we started kind of dancing less and being like oh man like this is happening so once we got to the starting line because it took a little bit of time to get up there with all the people and once it started oh just [Music] [Music] I was just like I don't even know how to describe it it just I just like let everything go I think I felt like like I weight had been like lifted off my shoulder [Music] remember we went through like two mile mark and there was music plane and lights flashing it was just it was just so much energy and people were just like I love your glitter tattoos we love your angel wings you know like people were just being so friendly cheering us on so we are almost at my oh five and then we got to mile five and I felt good I think all of us kind of felt good we got to mile seven and I was like all right I'm I'm good I'm good once we got to mile ten it was like we're at mile 10 we only have three miles left but at the same time my legs were like three miles just hit the ten mile mark work we were strong one of our girls went actually fast Becker our old racing and one is behind but yeah and I know even with Amy that was it was a shift you know cuz it it you get tired and you start questioning and you're like what if we don't make it we have two miles look with one mile to go everyone's cheering everyone's you can see the finish line it was like it just felt like like I was floating [Music] [Music] we cross the finish line and we all grabbed hands and we just held him and my that was like for me what had just summed up my whole surgery like the support I had from all of these people and my friends and they were doing this with me and we finished it together and I felt like my surgery and my journey has been so many people's journey you know and I feel like that's why I had to do this it's not just my story it's a lot of people's story you know and I want them to know that they can have the happy ending crossing that finish line was for more than just me it was something that I had done for something greater than myself you [Music]

Channel: Rebecca Zamolo

Views: 27,507,264

Keywords: rebecca zamolo, Health (Industry), rebecca zamolo ibd, documentary, educational, health, rebecca, zamolo, Inflammatory Bowel Disease (Disease Or Medical Condition), ulcerative colitis, Rebecca Zamolo, crohns disease, ostomy bag, Official, Ulcerative Colitis (Disease Or Medical Condition), Trailer, marathon, ccfa, uoaa, Official Trailer, Battle, rebecca zamolo youtube

Id: vYR4c-zBCww

Length: 38min 34sec (2314 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 24 2018