When You’re in Between Chronically Sick and Healthy
Feeling too much like a functioning adult to identify as “chronically ill,” but feeling too chronically ill to identify as “healthy…” It has taken the last few months for me to come to the realization that this is how I identify. Trapped between two worlds, neither of which quite fit me. On one hand, I feel so lucky that I am able to work a full-time job and do many of the things I want to do even while living with multiple chronic illnesses. On the other hand, I am constantly frustrated by the construct of trying to live in a “healthy person’s” world, knowing that I truly am not functioning on the same level as everyone around me. Living day to day with several “invisible” illnesses that aren’t always so invisible (dysautonomia, Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, severe allergies and Meniere’s disease, among others) means that I am constantly adapting to living and working with people who don’t always understand what I do and think about on a daily basis just to keep up with them.
I’ve thought a lot about the fact that even on the good days when I do feel like a functioning member of society, my illnesses are still like a backpack strapped onto me at all times. I think that almost everyone with chronic illness gets used to all of the annoying interferences — they become so normal. It is very safe to say that I am never surprised or caught off guard by sudden high-pitched noises and stabbing pain in my ears, or extreme hot flashes that make my face turn bright red, or my hip dislocating when I turn my chair, or blacking out when I stand up to grab something off the printer. But I constantly have to remember that all of these things aren’t normal for the healthy people around me. And because I work the same job as them and because I’m really good at pretending to be fine, these everyday things are shocking when they actually notice them.