How a life-threatening illness turned exercise into gratitude
The first few symptoms were bright red dots on my legs. It started with a handful, and I didn’t think anything of it, attributing it to red moles, which are common in my family. But little by little, the red dots multiplied, and my legs were soon covered in them. Willfully blind to worsening symptoms, I went on as usual, knowing deep down something was wrong. Soon, I had bruises all over my body except my face. One day, I cut my leg, and it wouldn’t stop bleeding.
Around August 2018, my family and I flew to Hong Kong. I had just finished celebrating my 22nd birthday earlier that month, with the mood that a new chapter was unfolding. Still, I was unable to shake a gut feeling that something was looming.
After a full day of food tripping and thousands of steps, I slept, unknowingly saying goodbye to a former version of myself.
The morning after, I woke up to countless red dots on my face and the taste of iron in my mouth. There were deep purple marks on my tongue and cheeks, and my body was filled with bruises. Full of guilt, I called my brother, and he looked at me in seriousness and said, ”I think you’re dying.” I could no longer turn a blind eye.
Burnt to ashes
Back in Manila, I was rushed to the emergency room and confined. Blood test after blood test, it was a living nightmare for someone who hates needles, and I felt the irony of how hospitals ironically have a way of making you feel sicker.
I was informed I only had 2,000 platelets per microliter of blood. The healthy range is 150,000 to 450,000. Teeter-tottering between life and death, I cried and prayed, sometimes simultaneously.
After days of testing, we got the diagnosis—Immune Thrombocytopenic Purpura (ITP). It was an autoimmune condition in which the immune system attacks and destroys healthy blood platelets, resulting in people being unable to form blood clots properly. The lower the platelet count, the more severely one bleeds. The purpura (purple clusters), petechiae (red dots), and bruises were all signs of internal bleeding.
After years of self-destructive behavior, my body responded in kind and started attacking me from within. I felt like my world was burning to ashes while also painfully realizing I had started the fire myself.
Blazing forward
I had started partying at a young age. In my early teens and even pre-teens, I lived day to day drinking and smoking, with too many nights that ended when the sun rose, always surrounded by friends in a cloud of smoke and a fever dream of booze.
But the next two years following my diagnosis were spent in solitude.
Apart from needing time away to heal, I refused to see anyone due to the medication’s side effects—including gaining an immense amount of weight, savage acne, brittle bones, and bouts of insomnia. I lost touch with friends and my girlfriend. Whatever life I knew was a thing of the past. My weekly routine consisted of blood tests, monthly hospital visits, and trips to Binondo every other week for alternative medicine.
Little by little, I learned as much as I could about intentional diet, while being diligent with my tests and treatments. Through tweaks, I worked on overcoming toxic habits while building healthy new ones—quitting chain smoking, binge drinking, and excessive partying for slow mornings with vegetable juice, active afternoons exercising, and evenings surfing the web, trying to educate myself on my health.
Gradually, I was getting the hang of things—building a new life as the feeling of being sick faded. I was getting stronger by the day, and from ashes and dwindling embers, a new fire was beginning to burn brighter.
To run again under the sun
“Your greatest enemy is yourself,” is a quote echoed across centuries. And if there’s a reason for that. It’s because it continues to reflect a universal truth across generations, classes, and cultures.
Through my experience with ITP, that idea manifested after self-sabotage and constricting beliefs. The harmful habits and years of substance abuse made my body attack itself, while my personally bleak views inhibited growth. I realized late that I was responsible for my life and what to make of it.
I started cautiously with low-risk activities like swimming and push-ups. But as my platelet count rose, so did my freedom. Soon I was practicing calisthenics, jumping rope, martial arts, and doing something I’ll never take for granted again—running under the sun. Even simple things like going outside, moving, and exercising meant everything after spending so long indoors, restricted.
Toward the end of 2019, I was entering remission. The new life I built from the ashes felt truer to who I am, and I no longer recognized my old self. I had changed. Like a phoenix, I was reborn.
I once believed there was only one “right” way to live, and straying from it meant risk. But that belief held me back. Facing a rare condition made me reconnect with my childhood dream: to be strong, active, and built like an action hero, now working toward joining future bodybuilding competitions.
After being on the verge of death, ITP nudged me awake, turning me into a more authentic version of myself. It showed me that I am both my greatest ally and my own hero—that health is not only my proudest achievement, but also one of God’s greatest blessings.
Staying active has transcended exercise and become a prayer of gratitude. And while I am unrecognizable from that frail, bruised person eight years ago, what’s most exciting is knowing that this is only the beginning.
