We are all unique and a long-term illness or life-changing diagnosis is different for everybody. How do you feel about having the label of a diagnosis like that? Sometimes it can define you, leaving you feeling like a shadow of your former self, lost in your diagnosis.
Sometimes the injury or condition can last a lifetime, or it may go into remission – which means, in part, you can continue with life as it was before. But the threat that it will flare up again at some point remains and you don’t know when it might be or for how long.
Viewed from the outside, a long-term illness can look very different for everyone. Some people can continue to work, and people might think that person leads an ordinary life. Other people are confined to the home or their bed. It differs in severity but is still an illness and because people can’t see it, they don’t understand it and so often judge it.
It can often feel like your illness is invisible and only you know how it feels inside. Only someone who is interested in listening to the problems you’re experiencing can properly appreciate your situation. It takes time and effort to understand about pain and chronic conditions.
In my experience, this is where a lot of the problems lie. I would see patients in my NHS clinics with long-term conditions who had seen lots of health-care professionals about the same problem. Often, they were repeatedly referred back to the same service.
Sometimes there might have been short-term relief from therapy, but not always. When you don’t feel like you are seeing an improvement, it is difficult to continue with treatment- especially if you’re feeling demotivated or misunderstood. A common phrase I used to hear was: ‘They think it’s all in my head.
There are also the unsaid thoughts of, ‘They think I’m not trying hard enough’ or, ‘It’s not going to work anyway. It didn’t last time’ or, ‘I’m only here because the doctor told me to come and I want to be compliant with health care, because I want to get better.
I wonder if any of these comments resonate with you?
The clinic sessions aren’t usually long enough to hear all about your problems; and this is frustrating as it’s important to be able to tell your story. To be able to express how it feels and also how it presents in your body. To describe the limitations you face day to day, compared to life before the diagnosis.
Others face a long wait to even get a diagnosis- even months or years. It can take lot of searching and chasing up to get one. Then there are the feelings when you do get one and what is offered to help you manage it doesn’t seem right. I’m sure you know that living with a long-term condition can affect your mood. It’s frustrating and can lead to depression and anxiety.
Having a chronic illness will inevitably affect family dynamics and relationships. The not knowing what the future holds and waiting for investigations and treatment. You don’t know what’s going on and your family doesn’t either.
This can naturally lead you to becoming isolated from your friends as you withdraw socially. Feelings of loneliness and anxiety begin to creep in. The symptoms of your illness make it very difficult to engage in the activities you used to.
This is often felt as a loss of the life you were living, akin to grief. Grieving for the life you once lived and grieving for the life you must now endure. Feelings of denial, anger and depression might be felt as life continues with the chronic condition.
This is what led me down the path of psychotherapy, hypnotherapy and the mind-body connection. I could see the need for therapy which treats ‘the whole of you.’ therapy which respects that you are the expert of your condition, but exploring things in greater depth and learning different ways to accept the condition (not cure it). Using appropriate therapies to learn ways of managing and ultimately living a happier and healthier life. Developing an awareness of how, in the body, psychological events and physical sensations are so closely connected. Without this appreciation, we can get stuck in a viscous loop which I call ‘the cycle of suffering’.
As The Mind & Body Guide, my aim is to explore these connections to help you gain insight and awareness. This could be looking at present problems or those that are more deeply seated: events that have affected you in the past. Things that you have been told and experienced which have shaped who you are now.
My approach to therapy is to help you to understand yourself mentally and physically. Then, working together, we can plot your pathway to a healthier, happier life.
The Mind & Body Guide.
Therapy for the whole of you.
