Learning how to cope with Chronic Illness

When I was first diagnosed I thought the worse!  I felt like I lost everything I worked for and I couldn’t see past the grieving stage, almost as if I was grieving the death of who I was. At the same time I was learning a whole new way of life. I had to learn to listen to my body and to forgive myself for having to break s or take naps or just allowing myself to rest.

I was a month away from turning the big 40 and I had a trip to the Dominican planned to celebrate the new decade but all of that changed overnight! I was soo sick and the doctors couldn’t understand why I wasn’t responding to the medicine. If it weren’t for this one special doctor who decided to dig a little further I would have had my colon removed and I would have had a bag of the rest of my life.  After a long 27 days in the hospital I was strong enough to go home.

I thought once I got home that I would miraculously feel better and all of my energy would come back but that the furthest thing from the truth! For the last 4 years I’ve been learning how to accept the new body God has given me and it has not been an easy journey.

For those of you that have a chronic illness you understand that our struggles are day to day and sometimes even by the hour. Every day I wake up I thank God for the chance at a new day and I pray that it will be a good day. I have stopped beating myself up for having to change plans or for needing more rest that day than usual. It’s doesn’t help that I’m an empath so disappointing people is just not an easy thing for me. Now I should follow that up by saying, this has taken me the last 4 years to understand. I had lots of counseling and lots of support from my family and my friends. The bad days were bad and there were days I just couldn’t get out of bed but with love and support from those closest to me I was able to rise above.

With all of that said I want to note that I still have my daily struggles but it feels like I have less of those days lately.

Things that helped me:

1. Counseling - My counselor helped me grieve the old me. What doe that mean? We all wish we could have the old us back before being diagnosed. I wanted to have my energy back soo bad it would throw me into a depression any time I felt the energy draining out of my body and fighting it only made it worse. I learned through years of counseling that I am stronger today than I was before getting sick. Our day to day struggles are not for the faint. I will add onto this in a later submission.

   
   

2. Support - I was soo lucky to have so many amazing people around me to lift me up on the hardest days and love me more when I was hard to love because of the depression.  Support can also come from outside sources, especially if they have the same illlness. I have a small group of girls that are handling the same illnesses and can understand better than anyone what I am going through. If you are looking for support please reach out and I’ll help you find a support group.

   
   

3. Get rid of STRESS - stress is one of the worst things for bodies even if you are medically very healthy. I found my place of peace , a place where I could go and close out the rest of the world. For me that is the beach, what is your place of peace?

   
   

4. Last but definitely not least, LOVE YOURSELF!! - This was one of the hardest lessons I had to relearn after being diagnosed. I hated my body because I felt like it just gave up on me and I couldn’t control it anymore. However, once I was able to learn how to love myself again, a whole new world opened up to me.