Guest post by Elizabeth (Hope in Pain).

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the term ‘invisible illness’.  During a hospital stay last year I had a discussion with a few other chronic pain patients about the benefits and drawbacks of living with a visible illness compared to an invisible one.  Oh yeah, those hospital stays get crazy!

With a visible illness one lady explained, you can never get away from it.  As soon as anyone sees you, they see your illness.  You’re immediately pigeonholed as the ‘disabled person’.  With an invisible illness on the other hand, you can choose who knows about your diagnoses.

While that’s true, the reality of living with an invisible illness means people assume you are just like everybody else and can, therefore, do everything just like everybody else.  This means constantly having to explain why you can’t do something, why you get treated differently…