Becky ‘Boo’ Bond, Body & Earth.
The onset of a Chronic Condition can creep up slowly or arrive overnight as a coup d’ etat. But finding ourself incapacitated, either way feels like a hostile takeover.
CCs don’t allow for a ‘mind over matter’ approach, no matter how hard we will our recovery, or force old routines.
Our first task is befriending our ‘new’ body. Imagine an anarchic world where nothing is familiar! There’s a new culture of eating, sleeping, dressing, socialising, new rituals & community, and a whole new language to learn.
We might be processing body dysmorphia after illness or surgery, changes in weight & body composition, living with pain or fatigue, all within a ‘revolting’ body that won’t do our bidding!
Be curious and get to know this new person, if you can without comparison or analysis. What are your new needs, preferences & desires? We must trust that the body’s somatic processes are evolved to always move toward homeostasis & wellbeing. Even though we don’t feel in control.
Getting to know this new self is the best way of being able to help those around you help you.
Making friends with yourself & building your community:
Finding community with a chronic condition is hard, essential work. We need allies including friends, advocates & health professionals who validate our whole health experience, physical, psycho-emotional, spiritual & social.
We exist on an alien timeline- with needs changing daily, weekly, monthly, yearly- and no prospect of linear recovery! We need time to figure things out, and become okay with lots of uncertainties. But with patience we become the expert of our experience, and learn champion ourselves. Celebrate all the small wins- as often outside reception varies hugely. Some folks hold onto the ol’ bootstraps mentality that web can get better if we try hard enough. Others have good intentions but no understanding, or empathy. But there are those who have been or are there themselves. If you know someone with a CC please, be kind.
We have to grieve who we were & the lives we’d imagined. If we don’t, we end up living beneath a constant shadow of comparison & resentment, making it impossible to cherish ourselves as we are. Treat yourself as someone worthy of care and respond accordingly, moment by moment if need be. If you can’t meet your own needs right now, believe yourself worthy of support & belonging. Start asking for help.
There’s support online & locally from those who share your experience and can make meaningful accommodations & adaptations to improve your sense of wellbeing. Or just be here to hold you as you are. In my experience as someone living with chronic pain & fatigue (who also works within the community as a health practitioner) the holding, permission & validation offered in such spaces go a long way to overcoming both the physical and emotional isolation that accompany the healing path.
Fatigue Friendly Somatics classes Tues & Fri 0930-1030 at Body & Earth (you can come in your pajamas if you need to!)