So I just have to say…
After coming back to this blog after several months off, I wrote my last blog post without really expecting anything (other than feeling a bit better myself for having achieved something) – but instead I find a couple of other blogs liking it, and following me. I do some investigation into them, and then I delve a little deeper, and I find a whole HOST of other blogs out there involving people with undiagnosed, chronic, invisible illnesses.
There are others! Can it be true? I am not the only person suffering with horrible unexplained symptoms every day?!
When I first made this blog, it was because I noticed a severe lack of support networks for someone suffering with an undiagnosed illness. I needed somewhere to rant, just for myself. I don’t remember finding other similar blogs, and I felt as if I was suffering alone, completely cut off from the medical world and also from the world of patients who have illnesses they know about and understand. I don’t understand my illness. Symptoms appear randomly, some go away randomly only to return again, some get worse or better without any explanation or pattern. The doctors can’t explain them or provide any support for me, though they are continuing to try, and my family and friends don’t really understand, though they try to be supportive. I felt totally alone.
I almost cried when I logged in this morning and found other blogs like mine, with other people who’s stories are similar to mine. Other people who don’t fit into a diagnosis, but are sick and suffering like me. It’s horrible, it’s sad, and I’m sorry for everyone going through it, but it made me feel a little bit less alone – something for which I am extraordinarily grateful.
Thank you to everyone posting about undiagnosed and invisible illnesses. Thank you so much.