Invisible Illness

After my husband helped me write up my story for the gofundme page, I had picked pictures to include with it and had my husband look over again. He said "Marlee, you can't share any of those pictures, you are smiling in every single one and look healthy and happy." I struggled with that. That's part of my testimony. When I'm at a doctor appointment either in the waiting room or in the office, when people start asking me what I have or what's wrong and start learning what I've experienced, they can't believe I still have a smile or positive attitude. That's when I have the perfect chance to tell them it's because of God and my faith. This past year what got me through a lot of the most difficult nights in my life is when I heard that "sometimes someone needs to see you suffering well." I look back on this past year and I didn't go out very much or do much socializing, but God put a lot of people in my path in unexpected ways. From a person calling from the hospital to do the surgery pre ops (written about here) to making lifelong friends that helped me or I helped them get diagnosed through online support groups. 

Like I explained here, having an invisible illness made things a lot more difficult in my path to diagnosis. Using a cane has actually been a mix of feelings. I put it off way longer than I needed to because honestly I was embarrassed to use it. I knew people would stare more and wonder what was wrong with me. Finally after I got one and started using, I saw that people could not help themselves but come up to me and start up a conversation because of their curiosity. At first I didn't know how to even talk about my health because it's so complicated, but with the more people that asked, the more I got better at explaining and saw what a beautiful opportunity it presents to share awareness. To be honest, after I finally stopped hesitating using one all the time, I was thankful to have it to make my illness a little less invisible.

I know it's hard for others that see me to understand how I could be so sick, especially when on the outside I may look even better than ever (since I've lost a lot of weight the past year). Unless you don't have an invisible illness you probably have no idea about the eternal battle we face about how we look and leaving the house. Some of my good friends and swim teammates growing up remember that I very rarely didn't have makeup on (yes, even while I swam and at practice or meets). I just felt more confident with it. Well when you look put together, it's hard for people (and doctors) to believe that you don't feel good. What makes this a challenge is, say, I need to go run an errand. Putting real clothes on (besides just the comfy stuff) and blush or lipstick can make others think, "oh she must be cured now" when in actuality you just wanted to feel normal and get dressed up for once even though still in excruciating pain and experiencing terrible symptoms. I remember a family get together awhile back when someone said to me "I'm so glad you are feeling so much better that you could come today!" I didn't even know how to respond because it was far from the truth. I just desperately wanted to attend the gathering and spend time with those I loved, but the whole time and two weeks after I paid dearly for it with worse symptoms from pushing it too much. I talk a little more in detail about that and the spoon theory here.

So back to how I started this post. I did post pictures on my gofundme page that show more of a glimpse of my severe and debilitating pain. I realized though that my other social media pictures can show who I really am. Who I really am is that I put smile on my face even when I'm gritting my teeth, tears down my face, curled up in a ball with my heating pad taking deep breaths. So if you want to see the pictures I had posted originally (believe me I had my choice of hospital and surgery pics to choose from), they are below. That's why I chose the name for this blog (with the help of my sister). I'm a chronic pain overcomer even though I'm currently experiencing the chronic pain, I'm overcoming it with the Lord.