The Hero’s Journey story and why it makes people react inappropriately to your chronic condition, My chronic illness started with a Big Bang. Only months before I’d been a fit, health conscious 35 year old career woman, living in Australia. We were blessed with two lovely babies, a loving family and good friends. My future was extremely bright, until it wasn’t. Quite suddenly, my tooth and face started to hurt a bit. Within three days I had searing nerve pain all over my head and face. It felt like someone was electrocuting me in the back of the head. My teeth felt like they were all being pulled out at once without anaesthetic. My ears whined to a deafening level. I felt like my head would explode from the intensity of the pain and pressure. I could not lie down or have anything touching my head. I sat up on the sofa, in the dark, for three days and nights, focusing on breathing in and out and breastfeeding my newborn baby at four-hour intervals. Anyone who lives
Recovering from COVID-19 with a Chronic Health Condition. (Updated February 2022) It can be scary to think of the implications of contracting COVID-19 if you have underlying health issues and that’s especially so for those of us with poorly understood conditions, who receive minimal support (and often even acknowledgement) from our healthcare systems at the best of times. I’m extremely glad to be able to write this piece, to be sharing some insights with you, and hopefully offering some level of reassurance to those of you who are fearful about the implications of catching the virus. I have Chronic Lyme and Coinfections as well as hypermobile Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, and I now consider myself lucky to have had Covid early on (March 2020), because we were already on the mend when the fear and hysteria were reaching their fever pitch. We didn't have time to worry about getting Covid because we were half way through it before we even realised what it was. Part of the challenge f