Whether you have a lifelong illness or are newly adjusting with how to cope with changes in your health- these challenges can impact every aspect of your life. The uncertainty and inability to control a health concern or chronic illness can be stressful and produce anxiety for both the person going through it physically and the support system trying to grapple with a new reality.  

For some, changes in our health occur gradually through observation of subtle differences in our appearance, our mobility, our cognition, our speech, our interactions with others, and our energy level.  Series of doctors’ appointments, referrals, specialists, required blood work, testing, and procedures slowly reveal insight into questions about our health. For others, changes in health come rapidly through accidents, illness, surgery, or sudden physical changes. 

A health concern, a chronic illness, or a physical alteration can impact our mental and physical wellbeing. This impact can be expressed externally to others or kept inside internally. This dichotomy of what we can see and what we cannot see is critical to trying to understand how someone is managing health challenges. In fact, so much of what negatively impacts a person’s health cannot be immediately seen by support systems, even medical personnel.  The patient’s ability to communicate what she is experiencing becomes essential to others’ ability to understand and provide care. This process of experiencing physical health changes that have not yet been defined can be scary, frustrating, and isolating.  

Consider the impact that changes in a person’s health can have on their lives, 

• Receiving a diagnosis: A person experiences their own emotional and physical response to a diagnosis but then also has to find a way to share this news with family, friends, and their job.   

• Considering support system: Common questions that might come up are, “how will others see me now?” and “will they treat me differently?” There is also a common fear of becoming a burden or a fear of getting in the way of others’ needs and/or goals.  Are persons in your support system capable of offering empathy and emotional support?

• Physical limitations: How will daily life be impacted by things like a surgery or a chronic illness? Will physical limitations impact the ability to work, drive, or take care of children? 

• Finances: What will the expenses for care look like? Is there coverage through insurance and if there is, is there understanding of how to navigate the coverage? 

• Loss of independence: Driving, going to work, running errands can all be things that are halted due to health. A person’s autonomy to make meals, bathe, dress, choose activities can be taken away. 

• Embarrassment/Shame: Health is personal and private; a person may not feel comfortable sharing the details of a procedure or a diagnosis. This inability to be transparent may create a disconnect with others who are trying to understand. There may also be fear about “bringing others down” by sharing the reality of your lived experience. This can pertain to family, friends, teachers, medical personnel, coworkers and strangers that we interact with.  

• Sense of Purpose: A medical diagnosis can force a person to redefine this. 

• Determining care: Navigating different perspectives on care both personally and medically. 

• Grief and Loss: Missing out and losing the life that you had imagined you would have. 

• Fear: Facing the reality of what an altered body, appearance, or physical abilities will have on your participation in everyday life. Facing the reality, of a shortened life span and making subsequent arrangements.

A lot of us don’t know how to talk about these challenges or even know how to bring them up. Whether you are the person facing health challenges or a part of the support system, having these conversations is unfamiliar and can be uncomfortable. A therapist can be there to help you face and discuss these challenges whether you be the patient or the caregiver. A therapist is there to help. A therapist is there to support.