I’m not “arguing for my limitations” or determined to “remain in” my chronic illness. I’m trying to explain to you why your Amazing Cure All didn’t work for me!  I understand it worked for you. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m not you.

Do you have my chronic illness or something else? Do you also have several OTHER conditions or just that one symptom? Are you 54 years old are are you 30? Are you also in menopause?  Have you lived with my issue for a year?  Six?  THIRTY FIVE?!  Have you just had three surgeries in the span of six months?

Did you notice I had cancer and can’t take hormones?  Are you aware that I just said I ALREADY TRIED THAT?! …and it DIDN’T WORK!  I’m sure I mentioned that…

If you’ve never lived my life, please stop trying to tell me how I’m doing it wrong!  If you’ve never walked a mile in my shoes, try not to step on them as you walk by.  If you’ve never had to deal with a chronic condition for YEARS and YEARS and YEARS, please don’t try to tell me, “all I need to do is…”

Why is it so hard for some to put aside their Positive Attitude Playbook and actually LISTEN to what I am saying.  I didn’t say I’m a negative person.  I don’t go around Woe is Me-ing all over the place. I’m not even saying that what they advocate is wrong.  I’m saying I tried it and it didn’t work FOR ME!

Are you aware that everyone is difFerEnt?  Notice how my hair is curly?  Yours might be straight.  Do you understand that what you use on your hair might not work for mine?  You may be able to step out of the shower and let your hair dry and not have it look like someone stuck your finger in a light socket, but I can’t.  To get my hair straight, I need to blow it dry for an hour section by section whilst putting each part in a big curler to keep it from curling up while the moist air of the bathroom works against me.

Know why there are so many different weight loss programs out there? I’ll bet you dollars to donuts I can find people who have lost weight on EVERY one of them.  Certain things work for some people and don’t work for others.  Everyone’s body is different.  If you don’t think so, think about DNA.  Even twins are not exactly alike in everything.

Do you know that many diseases and illnesses all have the very same symptoms?  The VERY SAME SYMPTOMS!  Think about what that means for a just a minute. If you are thirsty, you drink, right? I was watching an episode of M.A.S.H. once where they couldn’t give thirsty people any water or their kidneys would shut down because the underlying issue wasn’t just thirst.  Get it now?

You are not me and I am not you.  My issues may be similar to yours, but they’re mine.  I may even have the same illness as you, but mine is different because it is inside of my body.

Since I was talking about it before, let’s just think about something as common as hair.  MANY people have brown hair.  What color do you think of when you hear brown hair?  My husband has such dark brown hair it’s almost black.  My sister used to have such light brown hair it was practically blonde.  Didja know that, when I was a kid, my hair was brown with red streaks?  And the red streaks were HORIZONTAL?  I’ll bet you didn’t think of that when you thought of brown hair, did you?  My hair was so weird that a woman I had never met tapped me on the shoulder when I was a teen at the mall and said, “If you dyed your hair, you did it wrong!” My brown hair is probably nothing like your brown hair, but on my driver’s license it says: “Hair: Brown” just like every other brown haired person in the nation.

So just because someone doesn’t cotton to your idea of the perfect cure, it doesn’t mean they are “determined to stay in their illness”, are “arguing for their limitations” or are “being negative.”  Don’t assume you know and don’t judge until you’ve walked a mile in their shoes.  THEIR shoes, not what you think their shoes look like from where you stand.