Breaking the Silence

Everyone with an invisible condition experiences the isolation of no one understanding what you’re going through. This only adds to the frustration and loneliness of coping but I have accepted there will always be people in my life who will question my condition, think it’s an exaggeration because they have never lived it. And this I believe is the cause of the silence surrounding invisible conditions.

The fear of what others perceive.

When I was first diagnosed I didn’t want to be ‘different’ or have this condition become a part of me and my life but what I didn’t expect was the struggle to fit back into my life. To feel so alone where I had thrived. Some days it would feel like nothing had changed and others, people and places would feel foreign and uncomfortable to me - they had kept moving whereas I was standing still and no one understood that.

Don’t let people who are not on your path, not even anywhere in your direction make you question yourself or doubt. Accept that they don’t understand and let them have their opinions because you can’t control that. But control what comes next - you know who you are and you know what you go through, don’t let other people change that or make you feel like you are less because of your condition.

If anything you are more. You have fought everyday, pushed through every challenge and still you rise. Feel the Strength you have gained. Feel that fire in you. Stand up and yell. Tell the world that you have a condition, it is real and it is a struggle but you are not made lesser by it.

It is a difficult thing to do and your suffering is probably one of your best kept secrets for the fear that others will not understand, will think of and treat you differently. But your condition is a part of you and building a wall around it only makes it scarier and more lonely. Talking about what you go through normalises invisible conditions and lifts some of the isolation from your life.

So don’t be embarrassed about something you can’t control and something that is a part of you. Educate people, break the silence and show them. But don’t waste your energy and Strength on trying to make them see.

No one needs to understand but you and your circle of support and that is OK.