Chronic Illness, but make it look pretty.

I’m sure there are many ways I could go with this. I won’t drone on, but I will share: the pain feels like death—
like I’m the one winning this dumb race none of us really want to win.

I never asked it to make me forget about life.

And every day I find a new opportunity to remind this place, my body, that it is the temple it is.

The Story

While this is all personal, some part of me knows women are not alone in this hellhole of a medical system.

We know, very well, things have not been right for a long time, and the proof is in the lack of research.

Part of this is to elaborate on where I’ve been, to help you understand the person whose page you’re exploring. I am a chronically ill person, living with a disease called Sjögren's. I feel the dialogue for functionally working adults who are heavily masking is limited—either geared toward fixing the problem so you can function more efficiently, or reduced to random internet memes about how we’re all dying.

This disease impacts my bones, muscles, joints, hormone levels, esophagus, GI tract, liver, and more. Because my body cannot retain water properly, my nutrient absorption is also compromised. Ideally, my diet is my medicine, and supplements do what they do—support. They’re very helpful, yes, but particularly for my nerve pain, I have yet to locate an herb that eases it.

I’ve experienced years of head trauma and CPTSD that have ultimately led to a more severe case.

I cannot work a normal job. When I first began to understand this about myself, I was working three jobs at once. I always knew I preferred work I enjoyed—things that felt like they were contributing to the world—and I could never pick just one passion. That’s part of the reason for the eruption of this webpage. But I also knew there was more to it. I loved working, I was good at it, but then the waves of exhaustion and physical pain—pain to the point of tears—would come, and I would lose my will to work in the same capacity.

Then came the depression disguised as laziness, after the exhaustion of trying to make it all work. Something I think all chronically ill people face at least once in their lives (usually as a cycle). The modern capitalist structure truly ignites the atmosphere for this kind of thought process to thrive, while our bodies feel like they’re decomposing.

I realized how unable I was to sustain even one six-hour shift in any consistent capacity. I didn’t want to make promises to an employer I couldn’t keep. I genuinely felt unable to sustain my energy, and I knew this wasn’t something that was going to change for me anytime soon. This was two years before my diagnosis.

I want to make clear: while the concussions I’ve suffered over the last four years have created a worse situation for me, these symptoms have always been present. I repeatedly brought them up to doctors and was actively ignored—until a chronic illness specialist checked my blood and was actively looking for it. This disease connected all the issues I’d been experiencing, especially the nerve pain I’d been unable to explain to anyone.

And then there was the masking.

Let me first say, a job is not my entire life. However, when you live in a system that functionally defines you by what you offer to the group, being chronically ill makes you feel like you should be taken out back and shot.

This is probably the hardest part to express to people and work through myself. I am obviously still a human with energy, who gets up, moves about my day. I am a person, and that is value enough.

There’s a lot unseen that goes into making sure I can go about my daily life in peace. It’s taken me years—and daily practices—to reach the most optimal version of myself. Nothing is ever perfect. Sometimes, no matter what I do, I can’t find a balance that works every day. Each day needs its own equation, and I was only ever really good at Algebra 2.

So that’s where I start. From the beginning, every day.

The medical system stops after a certain point. The autonomy you have to sustain for yourself limits how much they can help you.

My will is strong, and I know I am capable. I trust better resources will become available, and I will live a life where—not my job—but my way of life defines me.

The Movement Forward

This webpage is my safe haven, as is community.

I’ve spent a long time debilitated by this. I’ve been shunned by friends who didn’t understand, fired, and not paid because people could write off my illness as my inability to work.

Therefore, I’ve had to move toward working for myself and seeking reliable sources of income. I’ve had to create space to use all of my niche skills and offer them. To expand my life from this point. To really work on not comparing where I’m at to others—a common theme in the art world.

As a healer, if I truly wanted to manage my time properly, I needed to create that space. While I’m not always working, it helps me. I have to manage my money better, and my social interactions too.

Time management is still the thing I see as my greatest potential success—or my downfall.

Art as Healing

As an artist, you learn quickly how much time it takes to produce something, even after practice and discipline. Becoming a skilled artisan is no joke. It also wasn’t something I initially wanted to participate in. So, I adapted.

I created a dog-sitting company that allowed me to generate a steady income while also giving me the time I needed for my art. It doesn’t always work out—the studio space, the moving of supplies—but you make it work if you find a way that functions for you.

I was always wary of making art and selling it. What if I couldn’t produce enough? What if people didn’t like it? What if I couldn’t find the right space? All valid questions and concerns, but I couldn’t allow myself to be my own limit. I desperately needed to make art, and I had always known I wanted it to be part of my income.

Art and healing have always been deeply intertwined for me. Movement, too, has played a huge role in my journey—reminding me that healing isn’t just a mental or emotional process, but one that lives in the body. Creating space for our own healing takes time, and the truth is, it’s rarely a gentle process. At times it feels brutal. There are weeks, sometimes even single days, when the weight of everything makes it nearly impossible to create. And yet, even when it’s hard, art is the thread I hold onto—the thing that keeps me grounded and sane.

For me, making art isn’t about perfection or producing something to sell. If people connect with my work and choose to buy it, that’s a gift I’m grateful for. But the real value of my art lies in the healing it offers me—a kind of wealth that can never be measured in dollars. It’s a private currency of survival, clarity, and renewal. In that way, my art is both my sanctuary and my medicine.

It is my will to follow the practices that keep me grounded—what steadies my mind, keeps me balanced, and allows me to stay in harmony with both the world within me and the world around me.

Art, in all its forms, is the lifeline that carries me through. Expression, in its rawest honesty, is not just a release but a refuge. These acts of creating and revealing are my solace—the place I return to when everything feels unsteady. And more than that, they are my savior, the force that reminds me I can keep moving forward, no matter how heavy life becomes.

The Rounded-Out Ending & Beginning

Solutions become daunting when you never want to look at the root of the problem.

Often, the roots look different from the rot.

I have been gutting the garden for far too long without planting seeds.

Art became my seeds.

I will be toiling with the idea of solutions until the day I finally move on from this body. I will share more on these ideas of living in a body with chronic illness. For now, I leave you with this:

We know our bodies deeply—better than any medical system—and I need you, the reader, to ponder those words.

We are the ones who must ultimately save ourselves, yet that journey is never meant to be taken alone. It takes the wings of community to lift us, to remind us who we are, and to guide us back home to ourselves. Each of us carries a unique piece of the whole—something to share, something to contribute. And just as we are givers, we are also receivers. We need one another’s wisdom, one another’s skills, one another’s presence. Healing and growth are not solitary paths; they are woven from the threads of connection, reciprocity, and the courage to both offer and accept support.

My journey in life has always guided me back to myself. It has guided me back to the truth that humans have never existed—or birthed—alone, and we will continue to do so till the end of time.

While I deeply understand I am an individual, having my own unique experience, I acknowledge the web of interconnectedness in all of this. My body is a way for me to understand how the world works, and how I function as a niche string, keeping the connection alive.

I will continue to live in this body, evolving this character, and living to nurture the lives around me.

And I have found: the ending is always the beginning.