Invisible

Sunlight breaks through the dark curtains, and burns the eyes.  It always begins like this.  The brain is awake, the body is struggling to stay in slumber.  Eyes try to focus, dry and heavy, until they are able to make out the end of the bed.  Legs are burning from toes to hip.  Pain that feels like an ache from the flu mixed with a muscular fatigue from overuse.  It wouldn’t be a far stretch to say that they are useless, just hanging there, but the muscle spasms from being held tense overnight tell you that they are not just hanging there.  They are very much attached.  Thumping, throbbing.  You roll to the side and put one foot on the ground.  A million needles surge the pad of your foot, and you jerk the foot up as if removing it from the floor will erase the needles.  However, they are there for the next hour or so, until the blood thins out and your muscles relax.  You take a step.  Movement feels like trying to climb a mountain of jello with spikes on your shoes. Spikes that go both down into the jello, and up, into your back.
Tummy is upset, but not enough so that you actually want to vomit.  Just queasy and sensitive.  Today is a pretty good day for the tummy then.  You smell the coffee pot brewing that sweet nectar which will stir your senses.  Can’t wait for that first drop.
Chest is fine, breathing slow and easy.  However, when you draw a breath, your torso muscles stretch, reminding you that you haven’t moved much yet today.  You wince in pain, but the autonomy of breathing won’t let you avoid it.  You take careful breaths, remembering the location of the draw which will shoot the pains into your lungs from the back.  This will go away eventually.  All pain subsides with time.  Except when it doesn’t.
Back is tender, from bottom to top.  Moving too quickly will cause a spasm, and then will put you into movement lock down.  Chiropractor will fix bones and alignment, but muscles and joints will continue to be tender.  Massage feels good if it’s gentle and lengthy.  Too much pressure, and you will break into tears or a cold sweat.  Not enough pressure, and it doesn’t ease the pain.
Arms are tired, hands are swollen.  Joints feel tired and do not want to move without much effort.  They feel “locked” and very stiff.  Closing your hand to hold something is not effective, and you drop a spoon as you try to stir sugar into your coffee.  Just another inconvenience of this condition.  You reach to pick it up and the blood rushes to your head as every joint cracks and creaks like popcorn over heat.  You’re just getting limber, you tell yourself.
Neck feels the same as the legs and hands, and causes a headache, and blurred vision. Ears are ringing and you have a hangover headache, except you haven’t had a drink in months.
The body just can’t get it together, no matter how convincingly you order it to.  It hurts in places and ways that you never knew possible.  Your brain is foggy.  You can’t put a string of thoughts together, and you can’t remember if you slept well or not.  In fact, you might still be asleep.  No.  You’re definitely awake, the kids just asked you for breakfast.  And so, you try to get it together enough to get your kids the things they need.  Only problem is you can’t find the milk. Oh, yeah right… it’s not in the cupboard.  It’s in the fridge.  Wait.  Why did you open the fridge again?

There may be bruises from previous stumbles, trips, and falls, but they aren’t what causes the pain.  The pain is in the joints, muscles, nerves, and brain.  The receptors are going crazy, they are busy and flaring and fighting and feel like they are going to jump out of your body.  Like boiling water through your system, the pain sears.  It hurts bad.

This is not a bad day.  This is an average day.  This is what it feels like right now in my body.
This is what my invisible chronic illness feels like.

There are bad days.  There are days that I can’t get out of bed.  Days that I suck it up and get out of bed, then end up crashing as soon as my direct responsibilities are over for the day, and I know that my husband (seriously grateful) can take over.  Those days, the physical pain causes emotional pain.  It hurts to know that I can’t fulfill my role as mother, wife, friend, daughter, sister.  Those days, there are tears.  There is mental torture to self, accusations that I can do better, I can try harder.  Only to try and fail.  There I lay, literally incapable of raising my head on those bad days, just crying and praying and wishing I could be “normal”.  It has been a struggle, learning that this is real.  That there are things I could do before that I can not do anymore.  Seeing the reality of limitation is difficult to say the least.  It’s not something I ever thought would happen to me.  I never imagined living past 21, I never imagined slowing down.  I just always thought I’d evaporate.  I never thought I’d grow old so fast.

You won’t hear me complain much.  I don’t see value in it.  You won’t read about it a lot on this blog.  You may not even know I have a chronic illness.  That’s okay.  I’m just tired from the party for Line, and I’m just posting because I want my kids to know that there’s a reason mommy isn’t moving very fast today.  They are too young to tell now, so I’ll tell this blog, and one day, they can read it for themselves.

This is what my invisible chronic illness feels like.