Appearances can be deceiving – especially in the case of silent, invisible health issues.
I suffer from a number of chronic conditions: fibromyalgia, osteoarthritis, PTSD, piriformis syndrome, asthma. Most of the time, they don’t show. Occasionally I move with less surety and sometimes I limp but most of the time I move with grace and confidence. I don’t look like I have to carefully plan everyday around physical limitations. I don’t look like a shopping trip necessitates several hours of rest. When I ride through a store on one of the mobility carts, I don’t look like I need it. I do.
Many millions of us suffer from invisible illnesses. We have to deal with people that ignore the knowledge of our physical conditions and instead react to our appearance. It is a level of frustration that is an unwelcome layer on an already difficult reality. I look fine but if I ignore my reality, it is at my own peril. I have spent the last decade learning that listening to my body is the way to stay healthy and productive. My mother’s voice in my head telling me to just push through it still isn’t silent. I am finally starting to learn to plan for reality. An enjoyable afternoon out with my youngest means leftovers for dinner. It means the next day is in softer clothes because my fibro may be up a notch. It means that I need to plan an easier day for tomorrow. I may be able to do more but I can’t plan on it because my body needs to recover.
One of my goals with this blog is to share the ways I do everyday stuff around my physical limitations. What is simple for so many requires an extra layer of thought and planning when you have physical and emotional limitations. Making invisible realities visible is important both for those of us that live with the invisible and for those that don’t see it.