Banker With Terminal Illness - If I Can Make It So Can You

On this slow morning, I wanted to take some time to inspire others and share my story and see who else might relate.

Summer Before College

When I had graduated high school, I thought I was the absolute man. I’m from the suburbs of Chicago, and that summer was supposed to be like any other from the midwest: pools, sun, and golf from sun up to sun down. It was the type of summer that sells calendars. In my shoes, I had just graduated high school, I was headed for a semi target uni (pretty devastated I didn’t get an ivy but life happens this way), and I knew what I wanted to do: investment banking. At the time I only knew GS and MS, I had never heard of a DCF, and I certainly didn’t know what a levered beta was. All I knew was that I wanted to be rich, and this was the fastest way to get there. Fast forward 2 months and my summer wasn’t exactly going as planned. I had developed psoriasis like rashes that came whenever I was in the sun/when I ate certain foods. Through trial and error, I realized something was seriously wrong. 10 doctor visits and 2 ER visits later, I was looking like the picture of health on paper. So the doctors did what doctors do: wrote scripts for antibiotics. This didn’t help anything, but I still took them.

4 months into college

My first semester in college was the definition of fun. Even with this “medical condition” of effectively having random psoriasis like flares from eating certain foods/sun exposure, I still found ways to have fun. Going to school in NY, I was clubbing, eating endless Cipriani, and doing groups dinners to Zuma every other weekend. My condition got a lot worse, but I soldiered on. During this time I did my first internship in VC. The day I started my internship I had a rash on my chest bleeding through my suit jacket. This was my reality. But I thought if I kept taking these pills it would get better. 

March 2020

By the time COVID rolled around, I was in bad shape. My cheeks were tomato red, I couldn’t eat anything without having random spots/bumps/and blemishes pop up, and I went into hiding. Ghosted friends, skipped classes, and was heading down a path to being a recluse. Then COVID hit, sending me to my parent’s house. While most people returned to school that fall, I did not. Because by then things had gotten even worse. My symptoms included: sharp needling pain anytime I laughed, sores on the body, swelling feet, and weight gain. No doctor could tell me what this was.

July 2020

Summer of 2020 was my hell. It took me to places mentally you cannot even imagine. I tried suicide that summer. Turns out its actually a lot harder than you would think. The actual mechanics to kill a human being are actually very tough. Out of 100 people who want to kill themselves, I think like 3 actually physically can.  Defeated, tired, and hopeless, I carried on. And while all this was happening, I did a corporate finance internship virtually for a company based in Paris. They would give me an assignment when I woke up (their lunch time), I worked on it and turned it around in the afternoon. Had it not been for covid, I was supposed to be in their offices. In many ways, COVID saved my life and boosted the start of my career. Without this internship, I doubt I would have gotten where I am to this day. 

October 2020:

I didn’t look in a mirror once that summer. It was only by a higher power’s grace that I got recommended to an unlicensed medical professional doing physical therapy that my story changed. He said I want you to take a stool sample. I was apprehensive at first after spending thousands on doctors across Chicago and NY, but I said sure. To keep it short, I found the problem: parasites in my gut microbiome that had infected my nervous system. Whenever you have a thought, do an action, or have an emotion, it passes through your nervous system. When that is compromised, your entire body is under fire. This unlicensed doctor had finally given me a diagnosis and 3 bottles of pills that she thought would help. In addition, he gave me an electrode machine that you stick onto your body for about 20 minutes a night to rebalance nerve activity.

December 2020

In the two months that passed I made major progress. So much so that you wouldn't recognize me. Gone were the bumps and blemishes. Gone were the swollen feet. I still couldn’t laugh or smile without some pain, but I was on the up. While this was going on, I was doing a super day with a MM for a middle office role. I can’t tell you the pain of faking a laugh during an interview when your nervous system is telling you to cut it out. We endure these things because we have no choice. We press forward.

Jan 2021 - Oct - 2021

Welcome omicron. If you remember, COVID cases surged during this time period, and it forced my MM internship online. The perfect set up. I continued to make a recovery in my health, but the lasting scars (as I was beginning to find out) could never be healed. I could only focus 2 hours at at time without then needing an hour break to reset my nervous system, and any thought that really pushed my brain left me out of breath, red, and in pain. I know that’s so difficult to understand and probably sounds made up, but it was my life. Fortunately for me, the MM role proved to be fairly simple given it was middle office, and I trudged on. Keep in mind all I wanted was banking. I kept sending apps, and in Nov of 2021, I got my lucky break and got 2 offers: banking for a LMM and the holy grail: the BB. I had made it. During my BB interview my body was so out of control I wore shorts to prevent a psoriasis flare on my legs. My face was so red after the interview from pushing my brain activity that it took 5 hours to settle down. This is my hell. But I made it.

Present:

I’ve made so much progress since then. I did my BB summer, and I got the return. I spent the entire semester before learning excel, PPT, DCFs, 3 statements: the works. I put everything I had into it because it’s what I always wanted. It was the happiest day of my life getting the return offer. I couldn't stop smiling. What I didn’t tell you? My morning routine takes 2 hours and my night routine takes 1.5.  30 minutes on the electrode machine, eating the same gluten free bread and egg with 5 pills, and drinking a probiotic smoothie while sitting down and meditating. At night it’s something similar. How is that sustainable, you ask? It’s not. I slept about 5 hours a night for those 10 weeks. When I got back to my airbnb, I didn’t go to bed like the other interns. I had to deep breathe and destress. That doesn’t mean I’m perfect during the day. Certain foods will trigger a psoriasis outlash on my body, and I can’t tell you what it’s like running to the bathroom during a fire drill to apply cream on it, but that was/is my life. It is not a good life. This disease has taken everything from me. With my current medical team, they say treatment is being stale given the parasites went so rampant for so long that it’s soon to become untreatable. In the past 2 months, I’ve seen some resurgence in symptoms I had during those dark days in 2020. When it comes back fully, they do not believe anything will stop it. Untreatment leads to a complete failure of the nervous system, hospitalization, and eventually a vegetative state since the body is begging itself to shut down. This is many many years away, but the cracks in the armor are showing. I’ve lost everything to this. I cannot tell you how much my life has changed for the worse. I’d give all of my days left to feel the sun on my face like I did only 3 short years ago. To be able to eat a pizza at 11pm with my closest friends, not worrying about the ingredients, how fast I was eating, and whether or not my digestive system could handle a pepperoni pizza.

I write all of this to you to say you can fucking make it. I was doing interviews, sending apps, and networking when my life was literally ending. When I couldn’t look in a mirror or have any emotion because of the literal pain that caused. I was 20 years old when this happened. That’s a death sentence to know you’re entire life will never be how you want it. Instead, you’ll spend it watching other people live/do the things you want to. And through all this, I made it to the upper echelon of the business world. If you’re reading this, find it within you to do the things you want to do. Do it while you can. Do difficult things. Push yourself. Through out all of this torture, I developed the habit of working harder than anyone else. Not because I wanted to. Because I had to. Now, nothing phases me. You think a fire drill or a VP yelling at me is going to shake me? A year ago I was writing a suicide note with my opposite hand because my dominant hand was swelling. You cannot break me. The world will take everything from you. But if you can just go a little further, hopefully, you will find a way. I write this as I am about to enter into a new phase of treatment by an unlicensed medical professional giving me unapproved supplements by the FDA just to make it through the day. If I can make it, you can make it too.