What do you see?

When you meet someone what to you see? Are you looking for something? Can you see something that isn’t there? We all have our own battles we sometimes don’t talk about. But many of us have chronic health illnesses that are not visible to the naked eye.

But what makes it worse, besides already having to deal with illnesses that probably don’t have cures and the treatments are not working, is being judged. Passing judgement is the worst EVER. Especially on something that we know you don’t know anything about(unless you’re going through it).

I am perfectly fine sharing my experience and my symptoms with my Fibromyalgia, and my multiple brain disease problems, and I am pretty much a pro with Scoliosis information. But when I get the look from someone like I am making it all up, then that is a completely different situation.

I know that the way society has become, the way you breathe is being judged by everyone, but it shouldn’t be and it is NOT OK. I know that it is hard to explain to someone how much you suffer on the daily, when you look perfectly fine on the outside but feel like death on the inside. It’s like putting on a constant show and being an actor. Especially when it’s talking to someone who doesn’t believe you.

I recently had an uncomfortable experience that happens all too often. When you have to explain to someone what you deal with for a particular reason without going into details and have them give you a blank stare. Not only did this person make me feel insignificant and unworthy but they made me feel like they didn’t believe anything I said about any of my chronic illnesses. I completely lost it and broke down.

It’s not right, I shouldn’t have been put in the situation to feel like this and shouldn’t have happened. While I get judged DAILY, ALLLLLL the time and I am aware of that. But this one time, it sucked. From the way it was handled, to how I felt, to how it got my anxiety going, and making me break down in front of my son, and a large group of people. Unnecessary. All because this person was passing judgement and didn’t believe me, instead of trying to understand.

So do me a favor, try not to judge what you don’t know, try to understand and be patient instead. It will make the person you are talking to feel better, and it will help you truly understand things a bit more. And if you can’t understand, it is much better than judging someone for something they are not. Because I guarantee you were once judged for something you are not. People with chronic health issues already deal with a lot, no need to deal with more. We rather you ask us about it then judge us about it, trust me.

-Your fighting chronic friend, Gelcys