What my photos taught me about missing out

A few weeks ago my friends got married at a beautiful 13th-century chateau in the south of France. It was a three-day, sun-drenched affair – local wines flowed freely, meals were served in a courtyard framed by palm trees and dancing lasted into the early hours. I’d gone on the bride’s hen to Prague a few months earlier and had been looking forward to the main event for a long time, not least because I’d been given the honour of acting as MC at the wedding reception. The only problem? I wasn’t actually there.

This wasn’t the first time – and nor will it be the last – that I’ve had to miss out on an event for health reasons. I’ve suffered with Crohn’s disease, a chronic inflammatory bowel condition, since I was six years old, and in those 32 years I have missed countless occasions, from expensive non-refundable holidays to birthdays, dinners and everything in between. Like many chronic illnesses, Crohn’s is unpredictable – I can be well one day and sick the next. Sadly, this was one of those times when the health gods were not smiling upon me. So, at the very last minute, my friends’ incredible wedding became the latest entry on my ever-growing list of missed events.

While I do consider myself a seasoned pro at dealing with disappointment, there’s still a particular sting to the sadness that comes from having an experience taken away from you. I wasn’t just losing a trip; I was losing memories that would never have a chance to exist. I’d pictured the bride and groom beaming with happiness, the dinners, the dancing, the little moments that would become our favourite stories afterwards. I’d imagined the person I’d be there – the friend who made everyone laugh with her witty MC introductions, who stayed up too late with the people she loved.

When I realised I wouldn’t be going, I briefly considered deleting Instagram for the weekend to spare myself the inevitable stream of photos and videos documenting precisely what I was missing in real time. But I’d made a conscious decision years earlier to stop treating social media as a reminder of everything I wasn’t part of, and instead to see it as a way to feel connected to my friends when I can’t physically be there. I wanted to share the couple’s joy, even from afar. Instagram stayed.

Of course, reframing things in a positive light is sometimes easier said than done. Because so much of my experience of illness can be defined by what has been taken away, I know that, if I’m not careful, these missed moments can manifest as a mental album of empty spaces. And while it can be tempting to succumb to the siren call of self-pity, I try to resist being drawn into its depths by reflecting on what I have been able to do, rather than what I haven’t.

So, as the wedding unfolded 600 miles away, I sat on my sofa and did what has become a little ritual: I went through six months of my camera roll, choosing photos to print. Many people are happy for their pictures to live on phones, in the cloud or on social media; I need tangible evidence of the life I’ve taken part in.

I’ve always been the friend who takes pictures – of the big things (the all-important group photo or the birthday girl blowing out her candles), but also the unremarkable ones. A chaotic kitchen table covered in bowls of snacks, cans of beer and cards from an abandoned board game; a group of my favourite people huddled together in the smoking area of a pub; a friend’s dog stretched out on the carpet. I like having a record of the ordinary as much as the extraordinary. I’m not a great photographer, and most of my photos are objectively average at best – but that’s kind of the point. These are my memories, seen through my eyes.

For me, being physically present is not something to take for granted. Snapping a photo is partly about preserving the moment, but it’s also about acknowledging that I was there to witness it.

When I’m unwell, it can be difficult to look beyond the immediate present – the plans I’ve cancelled, the things I can’t manage, the hours or days that seem to disappear. Illness can make you feel as though you’re always waiting to get back to your real life. 

That weekend, I chose to print pictures from a wedding I had been able to attend a few months earlier in Italy, along with images from a flamenco festival in Spain. I laughed at my friend boarding the plane to Prague for her hen in a giant inflatable chef’s outfit. I narrowed hundreds of photos of my cat sleeping in various positions to a few. There was the joy of dancing in the crowd as one of my closest friends DJed at Field Day, and the pride I’d felt in helping to pull off a brilliant Dolly Parton-themed hoedown for another friend’s birthday. I even printed a handful of photos from a two-week hospital stay earlier in the year – not because I wanted to relive it, but because they belonged among the others.

I won’t be able to print photos from the wedding in France, but I’ll always be able to look at the ones I do have and remember the texture of those experiences: who I was with, the happiness I felt and the little details that might otherwise have slipped away.

I’ve developed a habit recently of turning to my friends when we’re having a good time and saying, “Wow, we’re really living.” I mostly mean it in a tongue-in-cheek way – it’s become a recurring bit to make them laugh. But there’s something genuine behind it, too. Surrounded by people I love, I do feel like I’m living, not merely existing. And when I’m not able to be somewhere, I have the pictures to remind me of all the times I was.