CRPS week- the story of Weronika Różycka (wersja po angielsku)

4 things that my chronic illness has taught me 

Chronic and rare illnesses, disabilities - words that generally do not bring any positive associations when we belong to the healthy part of the society. In the past, when I was still training sports competitively, getting sick or even injured for a short period of time seemed terrifying to me. I thought that the moment you are disabled is the moment your life can’t bring any real happiness to you. And then I got sick. 

I still remember leaving my hospital room for a surgery that was supposed to fix a symptom and instead caused my CRPS and changed the rest of my life forever like as if it was yesterday*. The pain started in December 2018, to be precise, and never stopped. However, my short story here won’t be me focusing on how hard living with chronic illness really is or how much pain there was and continues to be - because the opinion that it is hard just can’t be doubted in any way. It is a fact. The surprising thing I am going to tell you about today is that being chronically ill actually taught me to see the whole health issue journey as something that brings valuable lessons and positives your way (just to be clear - of course, still, if I were to choose leaving my illness forever or curing it, I would without any doubt). 

The first thing I learnt is strength, resilience and finding motivation to go on even if all the odds seem to be against me. There were many times in my life when my hope was put into a test - several treatments in a row failing and causing symptoms to be worse than ever, feeling lost without a diagnosis or not being able to leave the house due to being too sick when everyone around was having fun. Those were moments in which my body gave my limits that it hasn’t before and they were totally separate from what my mind dreamed of doing. Every single situation like this required from me to believe that there will be answers somewhere and that the next day may be better than what I was stuck in at that moment. 

The next thing that I learnt is appreciation for what I have. The people around me that stayed despite me changing and kept supporting me through it all, the little positives in daily life and all the moments in which I got to do what I wanted (like traveling, meeting people or simply low pain days). I used to take for granted a lot from what I was given and CRPS helped me change that. 

The third thing is listening to my body in a more compassionate way. I’ve always been this type of person that would keep going until exhaustion. In some sense, it was a really useful ability while being an athlete, as it helped me grow physically stronger, but it started being quite dangerous when I developed a chronic condition. Crossing the boundary of my limits one day meant feeling absolutely terrible for the next 3+ days. But at the beginning I did it anyway, trying to get to the crazy expectations, which resulted in me being constantly upset, apart from feeling worse physically. 

Then one day I pushed myself too hard and landed in the ER after fainting from pain for the first time. One of my friends asked me then „would you advice someone with a chronic illness to push yourself as hard as you do?”. And the answer was „no”. Slowly, I started to learn how to be compassionate towards myself and my body. It started off small – giving myself permission to rest if I need to, cancel an invitation if I can’t stand the symptoms or not get disappointed in myself after not being able to study for a test at school and getting a worse grade. I still study, try to maintain a social life and fulfil my hobbies of course. I just don’t get there no matter what the prize, but listen to my body instead. I remember that moving towards a goal, no matter how slowly, is still moving towards.

The last, but not the least (what I am still learning right now)- I can’t control what my body does, therefore I should not blame myself for it. A higher pain day, not crossing out all the things to do off the to-do lists, insomnia, fainting and scaring all the people around me or needing help - that’s what brought me a lot of embarrassment in the past. I felt like as if those were all my fault, because they were what CRPS brought. Like as if when I tried harder, they would not be so visible. 

Then one day I understood that it doesn’t work like that. I asked myself „would you blame a blonde person for having this hair colour?” Of course not, why would I blame someone for something that they have due to biology. And I started to look at my illness the same way. 

*Before you ask - no, the operation was done correctly, it still isn’t known why some people develop CRPS after some surgeries and some do not)