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Posts tagged with “illness”

When Your Body Betrays You: Finding Strength in a New Identity

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“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.” ~Rumi

I didn’t know what it meant to grieve a body that was still alive until mine turned on me.

It began like a whisper—fatigue that lingered, strange symptoms that didn’t match, a quiet fear I tried to ignore.

Then one night, I collapsed. I woke up in a hospital room I didn’t recognize, attached to IVs I hadn’t agreed to, surrounded by medical voices that spoke in certainty while I sat in confusion.

It wasn’t just a diagnosis I was given. It was a line in the sand.

Before …

The Power I Now Carry Because of My Illness

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“Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it. Always work with it, not against it.” ~Eckhart Tolle

For years, I thought strength meant pushing through. Getting on with it. Holding it together no matter what. Not showing weakness. Not needing help. Not slowing down.

Even when I was diagnosed with a chronic illness, I wore that mindset like armor. I was determined not to let it define me—let alone derail me.

But eventually, it did. Not because I was weak. But because I was human. And that was the beginning of a different kind …

How to Work Mindfully with Pain and Illness

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“Can I sit with suffering, both yours and mine, without trying to make it go away? Can I stay present to the ache of loss or disgrace—disappointment in all its many forms—and let it open me? This is the trick.” ~Pema Chödrön

At forty-seven years of age, I have experienced chronic illness in some form since my mid-to-late twenties. This past year, I’ve also encountered chronic pain on a level I have never experienced before. Part of that is illness-related, and part of it is simply my body getting older, coupled with the effects of repetitive motions from sitting and …

How to Live a Joy-Filled Life with Chronic Illness

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“Living with chronic illness isn’t a life half-lived; it’s an opportunity to redefine what it means to be truly alive, resilient, and whole.” ~Christopher Reynolds

I have spent the past eleven years of my life in chronic pain. While this journey has been long, excruciatingly difficult, and deeply lonely, I am beginning to come to peace with my body. After seven long years of intense physical pain, anxiety, and depression, my mindset shifted.

Ironically, this shift began the moment that I got a diagnosis. In February 2020, I was diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. After seven years, I stopped searching and …

Finding Light in the Shadows of an Invisible Illness

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“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer.” ~Albert Camus

Life has a way of throwing us curve balls when we least expect them.

For years, I had been managing the usual ups and downs of life when I was blindsided by a diagnosis that would forever change the way I lived: psoriatic arthritis. It’s one of those illnesses that most people don’t quite understand because it doesn’t always show on the outside. I looked fine, but inside, my body felt like it was on fire. The pain was constant, an unwelcome …

Healing from Chronic Fatigue: The Amazing Impact of Self-Compassion

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“If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.” ~Dalai Lama

In my mid-thirties, my active and adventuresome life as a broadcast journalist collapsed. It began with a trauma, followed by flu-like symptoms that stuck around for thirteen years. Almost overnight, I lost the pep to walk around the block, much less file reports for the evening news.

A battery of doctors diagnosed me with chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), among other diagnoses. They said I’d have to live this way since there was no reliable cure. I became one of the …

6 Life Lessons from Working with Children Facing Life-Threatening Illnesses

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“There is beauty to be found in the pain. Life is brutal, but it’s also beautiful. Life is Brutiful.” ~Glennon Doyle

For four years, I had the honor and privilege of working with children and families in a hospital setting, with most of my time spent in the hematology/oncology department.

My role as a certified child life specialist was to help prevent and alleviate the stress and trauma of the hospital experience utilizing developmentally appropriate preparation, education, and play. Or at least that’s the “elevator pitch” I would provide during small talk and to casual acquaintances at parties.

The truth …

Releasing Fascia: A Simple Way to Reduce Tension, Pain, and Disease

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“Take care of your body, it’s the only place you have to live.” ~Jim Rohn

I hear this happens to so many, but when it happens to you, it’s unsettling. I didn’t know what was going on with me, and I wasn’t getting any satisfying answers either.

Most days were good, and I felt fine and went about my regular routine wearing my many hats: mother of two young kids, human mom to three fur babies, a household-manager-of-all-the-things and full-time dental hygienist. And then out of the blue, it could hit me like a ton of bricks… the backache, neck …

How I Found Hope in my Father’s Terminal Cancer

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“Without realizing it, the individual composes his life according to the laws of beauty, even in times of greatest distress.” ~Milan Kundera

When my father received a terminal cancer diagnosis, I went through a wave of different emotions. Fear, anger, sadness. It opened a completely new dictionary that I had not had access to before. A realm of experiences, thoughts, and emotions that lie at the very bedrock of human life was suddenly revealed to me.

After the initial horror and dread at hearing the news had subsided, I was surprised to find a new sense of meaning and …

Looking Back: The Silver Linings of the Pandemic and Why I’m Grateful

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“You gotta look for the good in the bad, the happy in the sad, the gain in your pain, and what makes you grateful, not hateful.” ~Karen Salmansohn

The 2010 decade was difficult for me. Hardly a year went by without someone close to me passing away.

When the tragic decade started, I was in the midst of my residency training and free time was a luxury I did not have. When I graduated and became an attending physician, I was too busy caring for patients on my own to take a break.

In 2018, my world was shattered …

How I Learned the Power of Letting Go After My Father Developed Dementia

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“There is beauty in everything, even in silence and darkness.” ~Helen Keller

When I was eleven years old, I would force myself to stay awake until the wee hours of the morning.

I was severely anorexic at a time when eating disorders were considered an “inconvenience” you brought on yourself. Anorexia was dismissed as a rich, white girl’s disease (although we were certainly not rich)—a disease that was easily curable with a prescription for a chocolate cake.

Although my emaciated body was a dead giveaway of my condition, it was school that noticed the change in me first. My once …

If You Stuff Your Emotions Down: You Gotta Feel It to Heal It

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“Sit with it. Sit with it. Sit with it. Sit with it. Even though you want to run. Even when it’s heavy and difficult. Even though you’re not quite sure of the way through. Healing happens by feeling.” ~Dr. Rebecca Ray

I’ve spent much of my life resisting my true feelings.

Anger made me feel wrong. Sadness made me feel weak. Neediness made me feel “girly.” Love made me feel scared.

I became an expert at hiding when I was feeling any of the above.

Some people numb their feelings with alcohol, drugs, shopping, or sex. I numb with control. …

The Difference Between Easy and Hard Self-Care and Why Both Matter

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“Sometimes you’ve got to look straight into the tired eyes of the woman staring back at you in the mirror and tell her that she deserves the best kind of love, the best kind of life, and devote yourself to giving it to her all over again.” ~S.C. Lourie

Self-care. An important concept that has become a buzzword. What does it mean? The answer… that depends on you. Google and you will find lists, articles, and suggestions for self-care tasks. These can be helpful as inspiration, but self-care is something that’s unique to you.

I work in suicide prevention and …

Why It’s So Hard to Just Rest and Why We Need to Do It

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“If you don’t give your mind and body a break, you’ll break. Stop pushing yourself through pain and exhaustion and take care of your needs.” ~Lori Deschene

In November of 2021, my autoimmune issues flared up. My doctor and I are still unsure which of my conditions—rheumatoid arthritis or fibromyalgia—was the culprit, or if they were acting in cahoots, but the overall achiness and debilitating fatigue were a solid indication that something was more active than usual.

I woke up tired, needed naps, and often ran out of spoons—a phrase familiar to many with chronic conditions, based on a gorgeous …

What Is Stress-Induced Illness? How Trauma Can Cause Physical Pain

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“Wisdom is merely the movement from fighting life to embracing it.” ~Rasheed Ogunlaru

Three years ago, I fell into the blind spot of medicine: America’s unknown epidemic.

After numerous tests, scans, scopes, and too many doctors to count, modern medicine could not find anything seriously wrong with me. I also consented to have my gallbladder removed. My first and only surgery at age forty, an “experiment” of sorts.

Six months into the worst nightmare of my life, my spiraling health started to take a huge toll on me physically, mentally, and emotionally. I didn’t want to live anymore, but …

Why Fibromyalgia Is the Greatest Gift of My Life

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“The wound is the place where the light enters you.” ~Rumi

TRIGGER WARNING: This article contains discussions of difficult topics, including suicidal depression and a fatal car accident.

I’ve always been an active, athletic person. In my twenties I was huge in tennis, squash, and swimming, and I began every morning with an intense workout that cleared my head and let me confront the day’s challenges with a relaxed, positive attitude. So, when I started experiencing mysterious pains and fatigue that didn’t go away no matter how much sleep I got, my life was turned upside down.

After two years …

How I Overcame My Chronic Digestive Issues by Learning to Breathe Right

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“If you know the art of deep breathing, you have the strength, wisdom and courage of ten tigers.” ~Chinese adage

Let me share a little secret: I started healing from decades of debilitating chronic digestive issues when I stopped looking for the next best solution and trying to heal. Instead, I did nothing. And I took a breath.

Let’s start at the beginning. I was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease (an irritable bowel disease) at the age of eighteen, which would have marked the beginning of my oh-so-anticipated adult life, but instead, I thought my life was over.

I had every …

How Beating Cancer Helped Me Stop Being a People-Pleaser

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“Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know.” ~Pema Chadron

The hardest part of hearing the words, “I’m sorry, but you have cancer” at the age of thirty was knowing I had to tell my mother and my husband.

Why?

Not because I was afraid of their reaction, although it would be especially heightened since my father had died of cancer three years prior, but because I was going to take on a role I had never experienced before: a patient.

For me, being a patient equaled being dependent. Someone who was needy and …

How I Overcame My Debilitating Gut Issues by Digesting My Emotions

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“I do not fix problems. I fix my thinking. Then problems fix themselves.” ~Louise Hay

Here’s my secret: In order to fully heal over a decade of debilitating digestive disorders, I had to stop trying to heal. Instead, I had to do nothing. What, do nothing? Yes, that’s exactly right—I had to let go of the search for the perfect cure. Let me explain.

I developed chronic gut problems at age fourteen—such a precious age! After being dismissed by doctors (“It’s all in your head; it’s a girl problem”), overprescribed antibiotics for years on end, or just given hopelessly …

How a Cancer Misdiagnosis Helped Me Face and Heal from Health Anxiety

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“Trust yourself. You’ve survived a lot, and you’ll survive whatever is coming.” ~Robert Tew

“I have bad news. I am sorry. You have cancer.”

Sitting in the cold, clinical doctor’s office on a snowy, cloudy January day in Chicago, I was six months postpartum with my daughter, and I felt like I had woken up in a nightmare.

My husband had gone to work that day when I was supposed to have my stitches removed after the laparoscopic surgery to remove a large cyst, so I was alone with my daughter.

When Dr. Foley entered the room, I took one …