Welcome to Gaia! ::

I see everyone's posts and I never knew there were so many people who have these problems... I always feel so alone because I have gradually dropped out of almost everything. I walk into the church I grew up in and people think I just don't come or don't care, when in reality I have been sick the last couple of months.

I am 17 years old and have had problems since I was 7 or 8. I don't know what it is like not to have pain every day. My mom has mild Fibromyalgia so we think I have that, but I don't want to get diagnosed with it because that will make it hard for me to switch insurances in a couple of years. Mine is so much worse than hers. My joints are extremely flexible and my ribs pop out of place and press down on my heart and lungs giving me chest pains. But it hurts to go to my physical therapy every week because my skin is so sensitive to touch and my muscles flare up. My back is always in pain. I go to the chiropractor, acupuncture, and physical therapist every week.

I also have adrenal fatigue. My adrenal glands do not produce energy leaving me always tired and weak. My immune system is down and I get sick easily.

I have ADD and OCD which makes it hard for me to do school. I am homeschooled which is good because I would have had to drop out from regular school. I do not fall asleep until atleast 2 every night because I cannot sleep. I have orthostatic hypotension, causing me to get extremely dizzy and my vision blacks out upon standing too quickly.

I have more symptoms that the doctors cannot explain. Blood tests, ultrasounds, new doctors, specialists, they find nothing wrong, but they know that I am sick.

But no one understands. I hear all the time, "You look perfectly fine". "There are people out there who have it so much worse". I never know how to tell them... And even as I type this post I feel guilty, like I am complaining with no right...

I think the phrase "you don't look ill" sums it up for the majority of people. Clearly in order to be ill you must be displaying obvious signs, like having a rash or running to the loo every five minutes.

Some people are so close minded.

Don't let them get to you. You know how you feel smile Welcome to the Guild, and I hope we can be some of the support that everyone needs ^_^

Gentle hugs sweetie. You are definitely not alone. so many diseases/conditions have no visible signs but are just a debilitating as those that are readily apparent to the world.

I've been going through this "But you don't look sick" thing too... I have no idea what to tell people either since I've tried before and people just get disgusted. I have ulcerative colitis so I get ulcers on my large intestine during flare-ups... which means diarrhea and blood... 5 times a day... it's painful and degrading. No one wants to hear about that.

So at least your problems aren't something so disgusting that you must keep it a secret. Maybe you should tell more people what's wrong, I'm sure they'll cut you a lot more slack in their judgements. It's rough, I know.