Understanding Living with Chronic Illness by HEY
GUEST BLOGGER, BY HEY
YouTube Video of the Blog, below the text, come watch or listen today
Understanding Living with Chronic Illness by HEY, LisaOnTheGo asked HEY to blog about Daily Living with a Chronic Illness for family, friends, and strangers to understand what it is like medically, financially and emotionally. Thankfully HEY (guest blogger) did so reluctantly not sure what to expect and it came out awesome, detailed, informative that LisaOnTheGo could understand. Great Job, HEY. Looking forward to HEY being a regular guest blogger and teaching LisaOnTheGo what is encountered in everyday life.
HEY starts the blog....This is just some rambling right now and I'm sure way too long to use yet. But I figured maybe you can guide me on how to trim it down or something.
Only a very special few can navigate the experience of being Chronically Ill or Disabilities with a truly sincere smile on their face throughout the struggle.
Being chronically ill or living with disabilities can be continuously frustrating. Most people go thru repeated spells of guilt, doubt, low self-esteem, anxiety, and depression. They’re days when you feel like a failure, like a lazy lump, and a waste of space. When they talk on the news about people in society who aren't contributing it's like they're reaching out of the TV and pointing a finger right at you.
Then the worst days are when you feel like a bad friend, a bad sibling, a bad child, or worst of all a bad parent, because you're too tired, feel too sick, or are in too much pain to do anything other than staying in bed. No-one has to say anything or do anything for you to feel this way.
It's miserable but it's also totally normal to go thru times when you feel beaten down and all-but defeated by disease and disability. Anyone who says they've never felt one of these emotions is either lying (to you, themselves, or both) or has never gone thru a major illness or injury. Some people have been sick since childhood, have never really known anything different and have lamented how unfair it is a million over a million times. They've looked at other people in awe at what their bodies have always let them do and wondered what their life would have been like if they had been born "normal". By the time, they grow up they're used to being different and feeling broken and have learned to navigate their path pretty well but resentment, anger, frustration, and heartache are familiar too.
No one is more accomplished at smiling thru the pain, in order to make other people feel more comfortable about watching you suffer.
Others have lived their childhood, adolescence, and adulthood as one of the "normal" until one day they face a life changing diagnosis. The body they thought they knew and could trust has betrayed them and very often the fallout effects every aspect of their lives. Like a thief in the night it has stolen away everything they once had and held dear and there is no getting it back.
Their relationships will all come under strain. Their ability to take care of themselves may fail. They may lose their job and with it any financial security and possibly health coverage - all of which just compounds and increases the overwhelming stress.
Worst of all they can lose their sense of self. They are no longer know what or who they thought they were anymore.
They too will eventually learn that special smile that protects their loved ones from their discomfort and discontent.
How do you get beyond the fake smiles and find real ones?
The things that may have brought real smiles before someone got sick may not work as the same after.
The best first place to start is with a sense of humor about whatever is going on wherever you're at.
There is absurdity all around us, especially in hospitals and doctors’ offices. All you have to do is look.
Start looking for the funnies in life and laugh at even the smallest things. Laugh whether anyone else laughs with you. Watch funny TV shows and movies. Listen to stand-up comedy. Call your funniest friend and visit with them on the phone or in person. Just find a way, every day, to laugh.
SpiritualFitnessOnTheGo.com has tools and activities for comfort, relief, encouragement, support from physical and mental symptoms, stress, anxiety and everyday life. Come visit our on-line Retreat Center today.
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