Unseen Reality
The physical effects of trauma are like a thief that arrives in the quiet.
Stealing all that you hold dear and take for granted.
An eye that won’t stop twitching, vision that blurs at the edges, food that you can’t swallow.
Headaches bloom relentlessly, dull and throbbing, until they feel like a permanent fixture.
Hair thins. Joints ache. Muscles protest without cause.
The stomach turns unpredictable, and pain appears in places untouched, ghostlike and untraceable.
Each symptom, on its own, could be explained.
Stress, fatigue, something minor, something temporary.
There is hope in that. It can be solved; a cure is available. An end is within reach.
But together they are a living reminder of a darkness others fail to see.
So, the one enduring it questions themselves instead.
Because it’s easier to believe the problem is personal failure and not the body’s response to something catastrophic and overwhelming.
Even the simplest parts of living begin to feel like impossible negotiations with a system that refuses to cooperate.
There is a particular cruelty in that loss.
In feeling your own body turn unfamiliar and untrustworthy.
It strips away any sense of ease, any illusion of dignity.
And layered on top of that is the ever present, nagging and persistent shame.
The feeling of being somehow wrong, somehow unclean, as if the suffering itself is a flaw.
To live inside that reality is not just exhausting; it is isolating in a way that words can’t capture.
Or worse, with words that won’t be believed.
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