I am healthy, working to become fit again and yet, I am still sick. You cant see it, I try to hide it, but that doesn't mean it isn't true. I am indeed, sick.
Diabetic, Edometriosis and Polycystic Ovary Syndrome. They don't show on the outside, I don't look green, blue, or purple. It means, my insides do not work the way I would have liked them to work. It isn't something I asked for, and its something nobody deserves to have to deal with and suffer through. But yet, I live every single day with this pain.
Its hidden, you wake up and you have stomach pain, feel light headed and occasionally queasy. On good days, you feel strong, on bad days, you feel like the world is caving in around you. But that does not mean I am weak, or my personal favorite, trying to achieve special treatment. If I could wave a magic wand and make it all disappear I would.
Taking medicine, and following a diet, while it helps, there is no cure for anything I have, like so many thousands of people, I am sick without appearing sick. How does this work you ask?
1. I feel good wearing them. Getting up in the morning and forcing yourself to feel beautiful and confident is not easy, but my clothing does help with this matter.
2. and most important reason. It doesn't hurt like jeans on my stomach, it feels so nice to wear yoga shorts, and a dress than jeans that sit right on the scars from my surgery.
I get a lot of looks and comments about taking birth control, people always assume I am sleeping my way across the country, ask me why on earth my parents would let me take it so young, make me feel like I am a bad human for taking drugs. But the best reason I can honestly give people is, its none of your business why I take the drugs I take, I take them for me. That should be enough.
However, its not, so here are a few reasons to birth control besides giving me permission to "sleep around".
- I have regular periods with less cramps
- Birth Control is the only real help for PCOS (Polycystic Ovary Syndrome.)
- Less chance of surgery (again)
- Because I want too.
I had my first cyst when I was 15. It hurt so bad, and I couldn't even explain the pain. all I knew is it felt like my insides were burning, twisting, and best of all, completely and undeniably painful. I was a sophomore in high school, this was not something they covered in sex ed, its not something I'd even heard of before.
My mother and sister were so scared because I would just crawl up into a ball and start screaming. But, I had not other outside display of pain. In fact, I could not even explain the feeling I kept having.
Luckily, my mom took me to a lady doctor and she figured out it was PCOS and that I should be on birth control even though I was only 15. It was an adjustment for me. It was weird to all of a sudden, have these pills I have to take at the same time daily, and if you know me. I am not one for a daily schedule like that.
I felt like I was the only one in High School with this problem, and as many people know, your high school psyche is more fragile than you lead people to believe. I felt like people would judge me, on overnight band trips when you cannot bring you own medicine, at first, I had to turn that in, thankfully laws changed quickly to allow women to not give that information out. However, I still felt awkward.
I look normal, I act like my usual spunky funky self, but there are times, when I am in extreme pain, and silent about it.
The most recent experience, was sitting with my editor for the newspaper I write for, we were editing my latest piece and while I was doing my best to pay attention and help, my brain kept telling me to breath through the pain of my lower abdominal area. I didn't look sick, I didn't act sick, but that doesn't mean I am not feeling it inside.
Discrimination:
Comes in the form of being told you cannot participate because you will be sick
- I was always cut from middle school volley ball because I had asthma, not because I wasn't good.
- Getting solos in band taken away because I wasn't in class enough to "learn" them.
- Being told to just sit and watch for fear I would break.
I hated being sick, I still do, I don't know anyone who jumps for joy when they get the Flu. I mean, that may make a great meme, but its still not what one wants.
I am sorry about this, but I just had to post a photo of these memes.
Both perfectly sum up the flu and why we all just ...
LOVE
Do not waste time discriminating against other people. Every Single day, somebody who is "sick"defy's the odds. and they should be rewarded with access to life, not shut away and told we don't want to see you... That is the worst logic I have ever heard.
I know some extremely remarkable people who, unfortunately got sick from one thing or another. They don't let that hold them back, and they don't shy away from adversity. There is no cure for so many things, but that doesn't mean you have to live every single day being told that you are a worse human for this reason!.
Be Strong, Hold yourself high and remember, what weakens you does not define you, it does however, make you grateful for the good days, and even the not so bad days, because you know, it can always get worse.
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