The hardest part of chronic illness is the waiting
Waiting for test results. Waiting for specialist appointments. Waiting for insurance to approve treatment. Waiting for a diagnosis. Waiting for symptoms to get better. Waiting for symptoms to at least stop getting worse. Waiting for doctors to call back. Waiting for someone to believe you. Waiting for your life to start again.
I spend so much of my life waiting. And the waiting isn't passive — it's active, exhausting, and consuming. It's checking my phone every five minutes for lab results. It's being unable to plan anything because I don't know what tomorrow will bring. It's being stuck in limbo, unable to move forward, unable to go back, just... suspended in this strange space where everything is uncertain.
The waiting takes up more of my energy than the illness itself sometimes. Because at least with the illness, I know what I'm dealing with today. But the waiting? The waiting is the unknown. And the unknown is terrifying.
I think people without chronic illness don't understand how much of our lives is spent just... waiting. For answers, for relief, for permission to be taken seriously. It's its own kind of exhaustion. The kind that never ends. The kind that keeps you stuck in a life that feels like it's on pause while everyone else keeps moving forward.