This was me in mid-November 2018. I had just received my first PICC line. The whole procedure terrified me because I didn’t know what to expect. I remember lying in my hospital bed, watching The Food Network to help distract myself, and the kind nurses asking me questions about me and my life to further distract me from the thin tube they were snaking up the inside of my arm.
This was my proud, empowering moment in a year filled with so much uncertainty, fear, powerlessness and many, many tears. A year or so before I took this photo, I received my fourth lung disease diagnosis right as I was entering my grad school program for counseling. Several doctors and medications later, I found a doctor who specialized in my disease. A few weeks later, that doctor put me in the hospital for around-the-clock antibiotic IV treatments. It was a really difficult time in my life. Chronic illness turned my world upside down.
I look at this picture sometimes and wonder how I got through the sickest two years of my life. I look at this picture, and I still feel some sadness for what I had to go through–all that my body, mind and spirit endured. All that I had lost.
But I also look at this picture and see the fire that chronic illness lit inside of me. A fire that told me to keep going, keep fighting, keep holding onto hope, faith, strength. Not every day feels this way, but when those moments do happen, I hold them gently and try to find gratitude in the present moment, knowing that this feeling will fade like all feelings do, but that it will return again like an old friend. Everything is temporary.
We live in a world that teaches us to ignore our emotional pain, stuff it down, pretend it isn’t there. My chronic illness has taught me how vital it is to acknowledge, feel and express our pain–and the risks of not doing so. It’s also taught me that pain and suffering can co-exist with hope and healing. But maybe most importantly, it’s taught me to be more gentle with myself, to see rest not as a weakness, but a way to harness my strength.
If you have been diagnosed with a chronic illness or condition and need support, read more about Hope and Healing Through Chronic Illness, an online support group. Our next four-week support group begins January 18, 2020.