You Can Do Everything Right And Still Get Sick

People like to believe that if they do everything right they will stay healthy. Unfortunately that just isn’t true. It’s a terrifying reality for healthy people to consider, and one that sick people can’t stop thinking about. The idea that you can get sick even if you eat healthy, exercise, go to the doctor, take supplements, or whatever else is incredibly upsetting. Trust me, it’s more upsetting to the chronically ill. I work so much harder to be healthy than the average person and my health is still so much worse than average. It can be very disheartening.

People who live with chronic illness are often blamed for their own health problems, sometimes directly but most often indirectly. We are told to eat specific diets or exercise in specific ways but these things won’t cure us and a lack of them didn’t cause this. I’m not saying good nutrition and exercise aren’t helpful things, but we need to be very clear about their role in chronic illness.

We are bombarded with supplements, products, and programs that will magically heal us. This isn’t new, snake oil has been around for a long time. When people are suffering and there is no cure, they are extremely vulnerable to these types of manipulation. They are desperate for anything that might help. I can’t tell you how often I’ve seen friends try fads that not only don’t help but sometimes actually make things worse. I’m sure I have tried some questionable things as well, I’m not immune to that desperation.

I’ve recently gone through my worst chronic illness flare ever, and it was through no fault of my own. I followed my doctor's medical advice, took my medications religiously, studied up on my conditions so I would be knowledgeable about them, was eating healthy, and exercising regularly. But my conditions still got worse. Despite all my work to help my body function well I still ended up on the couch for months on end, unable to cook my own food or do my own laundry. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve been able to drive myself to appointments in the past 2 months.

Here’s another terrifying thought: some chronic illnesses cause weight gain either before or after diagnoses and you can’t just diet it away. Illnesses and medications affecting weight is not a new concept but we still blame overweight people for their weight gain rather than acknowledging the root cause and helping them. You can eat a healthy diet and low calories and still gain weight. You can exercise regularly and still gain weight. With chronic illness and medication side effects, calories in do not equal calories out. And despite what every corner of society tells you none of this is your fault.

If you are chronically ill it is not your fault. If you are struggling it doesn’t mean you did something wrong. Well meaning people will often ask you what caused this and the answers they expect are things they themselves will be able to avoid. When the answer doesn’t lay the blame at the feet of the sick person, healthy people often get nervous. Rather than empathizing with the sick person they try to rationalize the situation to reassure themselves that something like this won’t happen to them. Most people don’t even know they are doing this.

They aren’t trying to be harmful. They are just scared of having to live a much harder life. It’s a rational fear, but it’s worth talking about. For chronically ill people it’s important to remember that those types of comments often do not come from a place of malice but of fear. For healthy people it’s good to examine your reactions to your sick friends to see if they might be received as hurtful, even if they aren’t meant that way.

I have to acknowledge that there are some bad actors out there. People who do not even try to empathize, who really do believe that the sick person must have done something wrong. They may even believe that what you need is tough love. But if you are reading this blog post you are probably not one of those people. The bad actors don’t go out of their way to read perspectives from chronically ill people. So if you are reading this and you are thinking about the ways you consciously or unconsciously think about chronically ill people I want to thank you for your time and effort here. No one is perfect but we can all try to do just a little bit better.