This is the second episode of my series talking to people who live with a permanent ostomy and exploring why they share their stories publicly and what it means to the ostomy community. I connected with Austin Powers on Twitter where he goes by Ostomy Guy. He has a podcast of the same name where he interviews people who live with an ostomy or who have other serious medical conditions. His path to becoming public about his ostomy started unexpectedly when he sat down to write about his disease journey. What started as a vague idea about writing a blog turned into a book, The Ostomy Guy Story: Memoirs of a Bagman, which is available on Amazon. Listen all the way to end to hear one of the many letters Austin receives from his readers, who are inspired by his story.

Find the Ostomy Guy on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and on his site, theostomyguy.com. You can also buy his book, The Ostomy Guy Story: Memoirs of a Bagman, on Amazon.

Find Amber J Tresca at AboutIBD.com, Verywell, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Instagram.

Credits:

Sound engineering courtesy Mac Cooney. "IBD Dance Party" ©Cooney Studio.