The Quiet Rage of Chronic Illness

You don’t have to perform positivity to deserve care, compassion, and a place where you are heard.

Nobody talks about chronic illness and rage and how you have to hide it to stay likable.

There is a quiet rage that builds up when your body becomes unpredictable. For example, when you wake up and your symptoms decide what kind of day you’re allowed to have, when you're doing everything right and it’s still getting worse. When you're in pain and someone tells you to “stay positive!”. Or when you are fighting for answers and people are treating you like you're exaggerating. It’s rage at your body for betraying you. It’s rage at the doctors who dismissed you. And it’s rage at endless appointments with normal test results. And it’s rage at the friends who disappear when you get sick. And it’s rage at how much you lost and how much you still have to carry. Sometimes it feels like it's a cycle that will never end.

Thank you to our patient who shared these words with us. We appreciate your willingness to be vulnerable and to share something that can be difficult to put into words. By sharing your experience so openly, you may help someone else living with chronic illness feel a little less alone in their own feelings.

Chronic illness doesn’t only affect the body. It can change your independence, your relationships, your plans, and the way you imagined your life would look. Anger can be a very real response to those losses.

Patients sometimes feel pressure to be the “good patient”—to stay hopeful, be grateful, remain pleasant, and keep moving forward even when they are exhausted, hurting, or frustrated. But you don’t have to perform positivity in the exam room.

If you’re angry that your symptoms are interfering with your life, tell us. If you’re frustrated because you’ve been searching for answers for years, tell us. If you’re discouraged because your test results don’t seem to explain what you’re experiencing, that matters too.

Those emotions are part of your experience with chronic illness, and understanding that experience helps us understand you as a whole person.

We may not always have an immediate answer or be able to change everything chronic illness has taken from you. But you deserve a place where you can talk honestly about what living with it is actually like and where you know you’re being heard.

Thank you to the patient who shared this perspective. The Living Radiantly Patient Perspectives series exists to give voice to the real experiences of people living with rheumatic, autoimmune, and chronic illnesses. If you have a story, insight, challenge, or triumph you'd like to share, we welcome your contribution. Together, we can help others feel seen, understood, and less alone throughout Clermont, Florida, and the surrounding communities.