It isn’t contagious: Living with an Undiagnosed Chronic Illness

Don’t mind me
I cried myself to sleep last night
It isn’t contagious
the worst you’ll come away with is a heart
or at the very least discover the lack of one.
The only thing even close to contagious is the hope I feel
and yet you try so hard to diminish it.
I can tell it annoys you that I’m broken but I haven’t given up
It’s easy for you
you can make judgements but you don’t have to live with them for the rest of your life
You don’t continue to feel this pain for years just wanting to live and do normal things without constant regret.
I make your job difficult and you act like its done through choice
don’t send me away with nothing and expect it to all just disappear like a dream
a nightmare
you want it to be cleared up for all of the wrong reasons.
I’ve been left to face those that act like it doesn’t exist because it hasn’t happened to them
They wondered why I stared into the distance after a sleepless painful nights and said I was bullied, abused, depressed, making it up
All because I couldn’t explain how it felt under their watchful gaze without wanting to cry as they weren’t open to understanding.
They tried to bring me down and put me in a little box that they could easily label and yet I’m still here
Looking for diagnosis that covers these illness’s, that gives something to help them, that stops them progressing, that gives support
I’m looking for a name that let’s me live and be in at least some control of my own body.
Excuse me if I want to live without consequence and fear.
I want answers but on the never-ending journey towards them what I need is respect.

Thank you for reading! 😉 I recently mentioned that I was thinking about doing a health update seeing as my last one was in January but I decided against that despite writing one down as I can’t bring myself to type it up. Recently whenever I think it all through I start to cry because I can’t help but think this is how it will always be. Constant excruciating flare-ups and hope evaporating just when you think it has a chance of changing. It’s a cycle as the physical will bring on mental aspects and likewise but you get scared to mention otherwise as thats what you will be put down as and you’ll be stuck making things easier for them but not for you (them being doctors).
I wrote this poem under my living with an undiagnosed chronic illness series (I will link the rest of the series at the end of this post) because not wanting to write an update I didn’t want to do nothing at all and go on acting like all is well when in reality it’s far from that. I don’t speak about it as much as I should in real life but I want to change that and get into expressing it through words like this, like I used to because I need to remember how good it is to vent, especially when it’s harder to cope than usual.

To anyone reading this that is undiagnosed I want you to know that you’re not alone. You will get the answers you deserve one day but until then do whatever you can to stay you, to hold onto who you used to be even if you can hardly remember how things were. You are who you were then and who you are now, you’re more for through going through these two different lives despite them becoming a half life for now. I know that it sounds silly to call you strong or brave because you have no other choice but to keep going but truly you are both of these things ❤ Thank you for reading and I hope you have a beautiful day! 🤗

Other posts in this series:
Waiting
A Name
Trigger
A constant reminder
Living a half life
Invisible me

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