Living With Chronic Pain

What It Feels Like to Live with Chronic Pain

Living with chronic pain is like carrying an invisible weight that never lets up. It’s something you can’t ever escape, and often, you forget what it’s like to feel anything else.

At the end of a long day, it feels as though you’ve just completed the most intense workout imaginable: climbing 50 flights of stairs while carrying someone, swimming a mile in the ocean, and then sleeping on concrete without stretching. That’s what my body feels like daily.

Every fiber aches, and this has been my reality for as long as I can remember. This is my normal. Despite this constant pain, I still manage to go grocery shopping, cook dinner for my family, attend events, juggle school, work, and parenting. But for years, I never talked about it. I didn’t know it wasn’t normal to feel like my scalp was bruised from wearing my hair up or switching parts, or that my legs shouldn’t feel like they’d been run over by a truck after a day of work. I didn’t know it wasn’t normal to feel like I had a massive hangover after a night out—except I don’t drink—only to have my body feel like it had been hit by a freight train.

And let’s not forget the feeling of walking on feet that feel shattered by the end of the day, or waking up in the middle of the night with my back spasming. And yes, the classic pounding headache and relentless abdominal cramps.

I’ve been told before that I was a hypochondriac or that I was always complaining, so I learned to suppress it. Who wants to constantly be seen as someone who complains or isn’t “strong” enough to power through? I can’t stay in bed for long anyway. This is my everyday existence. It’s become who I am. So when you meet someone, understand that we are all fighting our own battles, and pain is just one layer of the many struggles we face. Things are not always as they appear on the surface.

Photo by Amanda Eversz
Location: Rockledge Gardens
Dress by The King’s Daughter Bridal Boutique & Formal Wear