Disclaimer: The following is a personal diary entry from January 2021

Over the last few weeks, I’ve felt as if my recent writing is lacking flavor. Over the last few months, any moments of creativity come in short bursts. I have been dealing with chronic pain and mental illness. I feel useless.

Happiness is fleeting when dealing with the pain. The pain is making it difficult to communicate with friends and family, and on the rare occasions that I get to call a friend or leave my home, I can’t find joy in these moments.

I feel like I have lost chances to improve my life because of the suffering that I can’t escape from. I want to say that I hate the situation that I find myself in, but I feel like saying “I hate the pain” is an understatement.

The truth is that I hate feeling trapped in this body and trapped inside my mind. I hate the way this is affecting my mind. I feel like this is never-ending. I can’t seem to fix this. A person who deals with chronic illness often feels burdensome to the people around them. When I find myself struggling, I instinctively shut out family and friends. Because I feel like sharing the pain or wearing a pained expression will make the people sad. I don’t want my friends and family to hurt. I feel like me being in pain is bad enough, and I don’t want to bring more pain into the world.

I feel like I’m losing chances at happiness because I want to be anti-social. I planned to start up a Sims Youtube channel and haven’t even uploaded the game. It sucks that I feel like I have no drive to do the things that I enjoy.

Please be kind to your friends struggling with chronic pain. We are trying to get through the day. Sometimes I feel the need to pray that I see another day.

Feature photo courtesy of Canva, edited by Keely Messino