How do you explain “it”?

September 13, 2011

I came across this video today, and it got me thinking about the different levels of understanding that other people have.

 

Of course, the people who best understand what it’s like to live with chronic illnesses are the people who have chronic illnesses themselves.  If you’ve got them, you probably have a pretty good understanding of the difficulties, the unpredictability, the social isolation.  Yeah, fun stuff, right?

 

I’d say the next layer are the people who knew me back before the illnesses/symptoms.  These are the friends and family who don’t have CIs themselves, but they’ve watched me go through it.  They’ve been there for me, supported me, seen the ups and downs.  I may not tell them everything, but they know more than anyone else possibly could.  And they know what to expect.  They don’t get upset or even question if I have to cancel plans at the last minute.  They ask in advance if I need to sit down, if I need different food, if they can help in any way.  These people make it all more manageable.  Thank you.

 

Then there are the strangers who just assume they understand.  They don’t get it.  On good days, I try to educate them.  On not-so-good days, I just ignore them.  I’d love to educate everyone, but some days, it’s just not worth it.

 

Hardest of all, there are co-workers, acquaintances, and new friends.  These are the folks like in the video above.  They honestly want to understand, they truly try, and most often, they miserably fail.  They equate my illnesses with their recent bout of flu, they think my pain is like the time they sprained an ankle, they assume my exhaustion can be cured as theirs can, by going to bed early for some extra sleep.  They don’t see why my health problems are so different from theirs, why I can’t just push through the symptoms.  It’s harder to educate them because they are close enough to really care, so they offer too many unhelpful suggestions.  It’s important to educate them because I will keep coming into contact with them over and over.

 

Over the years I’ve gotten better at explaining my symptoms and limitations, but I still haven’t found a way to truly convey it all.  If anyone has any suggestions, I’d love to hear them.  In the meantime, I’ll just keep trying to get my point across, a little bit at a time.

 

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Leave a Comment » | Educating, Expectations, Frustration, Insensitive, Isolation, Kindness, Limitations, Rants, Raves, Support, Thoughtfulness, Unpredictable | Permalink
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Planning for the unpredictable

September 10, 2011

The air is cool and clear, the sun is shining… it’s a gorgeous day here in Boston.  It’s a day to be outdoors!

So I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised when my friend called me up and asked if we could switch our plans from being indoors this afternoon to taking a walk around a pond.  It’s a great idea, actually.  I bet it’ll be beautiful, and I’ll love watching her little girls run and play.

I give a lot of credit to my friend.  She was very careful to make it clear that we could stay closer to home or do something else if I didn’t feel up to this.  She’s really great that way.  We’ve been friends a long time, and she “gets it.”  The problem is, I want to do this.  And I do feel up to it right now.  I just don’t know how I’ll feel afterwards.  I might be completely exhausted.  And I have plans to celebrate a friend’s birthday tonight, something I’ve been looking forward to for a long time.  So if I walk around the pond, will I be too tired later for anything else?  I won’t have much time to rest in between, unfortunately, because of how things time out.

I’ll just have to take a chance, and try to do both, and hope I don’t regret it later or tomorrow.  I hope this works out!  It would be so nice to be able to predict these things, but that’s just not possible.

 

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Religion and/or/with/versus Chronic Illness

September 9, 2011

I don’t give much thought to religion and its relationship with chronic illness anymore.  I suppose I used to, but that was a long time ago.  In fact, I’m only thinking about it now because I got an email today that it’s the topic of this week’s Chronic Babe blog carnival.  It’s an important topic, though, and like with most other things, I have very definite opinions about it, so even though this is less of a rant or a rave and more of a reflection, here goes….

Like most Americans, I was raised in a household with religion.  In our case, we were not devout.  We attended services on the major holidays, celebrated with family and friends, and occasionally, but not consistently, celebrated some minor holidays.  I attended religious school for many, many years, so I knew a lot about how things were supposed to work.  I knew the prayers, the customs, and the bible stories.  The problem was, I started doubting from a  young age.  When I was three, I asked the teacher at my religious preschool, “If god made the universe, then who made god?”  I was told not to ask that question.  I was told that god just was.  Maybe that was the right answer for some three-year-olds, but it wasn’t the right answer for me.  That started me doubting, and the doubts never went away.

So that’s my pre-illness religious background.  When I was 12, I still went to religious school, still went to services, still celebrated holidays.  I also now had some mysterious pain.  At 12, I really didn’t think too much about some higher being giving me the pain, and I never considered praying for a higher being to take the pain away.  Having never believed that a god of some sort controlled the minutia of my life, such as my friendships or my grades or whether or not I got a particular birthday gift, this seemed no different than anything else.  I celebrated the holidays in a cultural way, and I thought about G-O-D, but I didn’t know what exactly I believed.  I was scared not to believe (some of those bible stories are scary!) but I didn’t have that “feeling” that so many adults talked about.  When I said to myself, “Please make the pain go away!” I wasn’t praying to any being in particular.  I was putting words to the hope that I felt that maybe, someday, things would get better.  Maybe that’s all prayer is?  I don’t know.

Everything changed in college, as it so often does.  I was living on my own for the first time.  I went to services more, actually, at the beginning, because I felt a connection to the people there, and it reminded me of home.  After I while, I realized that I wasn’t going for the services anymore, I was going only for the people and for the community.  Over the years, I gave it more thought, and finally admitted to myself that I just don’t believe in any higher being. My guess is that illness or no illness, I never would have.   To me, the monotheistic god, the Greek gods, the ancient Egyptian gods, and the Flying Spaghetti Monster all seemed equally unlikely to exist.  Still, the illness gave me an interesting perspective.

On the one hand, why would I want to believe in a being that would make me ill?  Or in one that wouldn’t make me better?  I’m a good person.  I help others.  I volunteer at nonprofits.  I go out of my way for strangers.  Why would I want to believe in a being that would do this to me?

On the other hand, I see religious and spiritual people who take great comfort in their beliefs.  I am incredibly jealous of them.  I want that.  Who wouldn’t want that?  Going through the fear, uncertainty, and difficulties of chronic illness, how nice it must be to have a proactive course of action (praying) at your fingertips all the time.  How wonderful to have a community of strangers ready to step up for you.  How nice to have hope.  Of course I want that!  I want that, but I can’t manufacture beliefs for the convenience of a support network and what I think of as false hope.

It seems to me that most people either become much more religious or much less so after a big diagnosis (or the diagnosis of a loved one.)  As far as I can tell, this happens for the reasons I just gave: either they can’t stand to believe in a being that would do this to them, or they need to believe in a being that can cure them.

The answer is different for everyone.  My path has led me to where I am now.  Maybe one day my beliefs will change.  Maybe they won’t.  I think the important thing is to feel comfortable with where I am now.  Thankfully, I do.  I get frustrated when others try to force their religion on me, but that has little to do with my health, and more to do with their desire for proselytizing.  We all believe in different things.  Thirty years after preschool, I don’t believe in god.  But I’m excited to celebrate the holidays with my family!

 

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No, we’re not all the same

September 8, 2011

I saw a story on the news the other night about a woman who went to McDonald’s with her two autistic sons and their service dog.  The store manager was there (though not working at the time) and told the woman that the dog was not allowed because they weren’t blind.  The mother offered to provide documentation, but the manager insisted that they leave.

There’s more to this story, but I want to focus on the common misconception that only people who are visibly disabled would need a service dog.  Invisible disabilities can make life easier in some ways, because you can “pass” for healthy.  On the other hand, invisible disabilities mean that people often don’t believe you have a problem.  And visible disabilities that are misunderstood?  You’re out of luck there too.  We need more education.  We need people to understand that service dogs are for people who are blind, and also for those who are autistic or suffering from PTSD or who have epilepsy.  There are many many more reasons why someone would have a service dog.  People need ways to learn this.

When I was in elementary school, maybe around 4th grade, we had a program on disabilities.  Someone came in and spoke to us.  They taught us how to sign the alphabet, and we had to communicate with each other that way.  We were blindfolded and led through the hallways by a classmate, trusting them to guide us safely.  We had our dominant hand tied behind our back, then were told to write with the other hand.  We learned what to do if someone has an epileptic seizure in front of us and what to do if a diabetic needs insulin.  This was long before I had any health problems of my own, and as far as I knew, none of my friends or family had any problems either (I was wrong, but hey, I was a kid – what did I know?)  Still, I paid attention.  Obviously this program had a real affect on me, because I remember it all these years later.  Imagine what would happen if we offered programs like these in each grade, adjusting the material for each age group.  Imagine how much more understanding the next generation would be!

People make a lot of incorrect assumptions.  Sometimes the person is at fault, but very often they just lack the knowledge needed to make informed decisions.  Let’s help them by giving them the knowledge they need.  Let’s educate them!

 

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