My Spoonie Sisters
Welcome to My Spoonie Sisters! If you're wondering what a "Spoonie" is, it’s a term lovingly embraced by those living with chronic illnesses, based on the Spoon Theory. It’s all about managing our limited energy (or “spoons”) while navigating life’s challenges.
Each week, join us to hear from your "Spoonie Sisters" host, co-hosts, and our inspiring special guests as we share real-life stories, tips, and encouragement. Whether you're here to learn, connect, or feel less alone, you’ll find a supportive space filled with understanding, laughter, and strength. Let’s journey through chronic illness together!
Tune in and join the sisterhood!
All guests featured or mentioned in this podcast will be listed for your convenience. Don't forget to rate and subscribe to My Spoonie Sisters and follow @MySpoonieSisters on Instagram for updates on new episodes and more. If you have a story to share or want to be featured on My Spoonie Sisters, please email MySpoonieSisters@gmail.com. We eagerly look forward to speaking and hearing from all our Spoonies!
Disclaimer: While we are not doctors or healthcare Practitioners, we want to assure you that this podcast is a credible source of information. It's based on our guests' personal experiences and the strategies we've found effective for ourselves. However, everyone's body is unique, and what works for one person may not work for another. If you have any health-related questions, it's always best to consult your Primary Doctor or Rheumatologist.
Remember, our goal at My Spoonie Sisters is to connect people and provide them with the support and tools they need to live better lives.
My Spoonie Sisters
Competition or Comparison: Finding Your Place in Chronic Illness
Have you ever found yourself scrolling through social media, seeing others with your same diagnosis seemingly thriving while you struggle to get out of bed? That gnawing feeling of "why them and not me?" isn't something we talk about enough in the chronic illness community.
The Spoonie Sisters dive deep into the complicated emotions of competition and comparison that silently impact many people with chronic conditions. Hosts Jen Weaver, Andi Byers, Linnea Knisley, and Angelic Ingram share their raw, honest experiences with jealousy, anger, and the overwhelming feelings that come when we measure our journeys against others.
Each sister reveals their personal turning point - from Andi's sixteen years of fighting for diagnosis validation while serving in the military to Linnea's realization that social media only shows highlight reels of chronic illness, not the full 24-hour reality. These powerful stories illuminate how comparison steals our joy and delays our healing, while community support transforms our experience.
For those newly diagnosed, this episode offers priceless wisdom: focus on your own journey, give yourself grace for small accomplishments, set healthy boundaries, and most importantly, let go of yesterday's struggles to embrace today's possibilities. As Linnea beautifully summarizes, "Compete in kindness instead of competing in suffering." Every win for one person in our community lifts us all.
Ready to transform your relationship with comparison and find your place in the chronic illness community? Listen now and remember that your journey isn't meant to look like anyone else's - it's uniquely, powerfully yours.
Are you living with a chronic illness and want to make your voice heard? Rare Patient Voice connects patients and caregivers with research opportunities—so you can share your experiences and get paid for your time! Your insights help drive real change in healthcare.
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Welcome back to another episode of my Spoonie Sisters. And today you've got Andy Byers, linnea Knisley, angelique Ingram and, of course myself, jen Weaver, and we are going to talk about competition. Is it healthy? Ooh, I feel like that's a loaded question Big time, even in the chronic illness community, we have the sneaky thing that wants to come on in and take over our hearts, our minds and our brains Competition People trying to get the spot, trying to get the blog post, trying to get the feature. Ouch, because there's room for all of us, there's spaces for us to share and to work together and to support each other, because, at the end of the day, that's our goal is to help the community and support each other, or at least that's what it should be.
Speaker 2:What are your thoughts? Absolutely. I think that comparison in such a way is healthy because we want to. We look up to a lot of those people that we see out there, like I'm inspired by you guys. I take that as motivation for myself to want to show up more, to want to do things. But if I was to sit here and say, oh my God, linnea just came out with this journal, this amazing journal, and I suck, that could really, if I spiral down that spiral, that could really bring me down to a negative space where I won't show up and where I won't do the things that I want to do, where I won't make the messages that I want to share with the community. So you know, I think competition is healthy, but it can also be very, very unhealthy, depending on where your mindset is and I think it's all around the mindset, right, girls? I think it's just. It depends on where you're at in your space and how secure you are with what you're wanting to do with your work and how you want to show up.
Speaker 3:I think sometimes we confuse the two of inspiration and comparison and they're not interchangeable. So I like that. Angelique mentioned you guys in such and such inspires, right, and then we choose sometimes to go from inspiration to comparison, but they're not interchangeable. We are inspired by a person and then we compare all of our, all of the things that we may have done similarly. That didn't play out the same, because we took the inspiration as the blueprint versus taking the inspiration for what it was, as this inspired me to authentically show up as myself, not as myself in someone else's expectation or not as myself in someone else's box or process, and I think it gets mixed up so much that it becomes very catty.
Speaker 3:I'm very much so inspired by all of you, ladies, but not in a way that would make me go. Let me then tear you down, or let me say that I saw what you did, but I can do it better. I think that's where we flipped it in a way that is unhealthy and toxic, when we take the inspiration and go but I can do that better. Where comparison comes in, I see what you did, but I can do that better, versus when comparison comes in, I see what you did, but I can do that better versus. I see what you did and I appreciate that. Can you show me how you did it, or do you mind sharing so that we can grow? We play this game of gatekeeping where the information dies with us, and that shouldn't be the case either.
Speaker 1:Right, right, yeah, gatekeeping. You threw that word out there, I did, I did. I'm kind of feeling guilty right now and I know we're having a very serious conversation, but I'm going to bring a little bit of humor in there, because it was brought to my attention. Angelique, I wish you would have been on this call. I was just having a chat with you know, andy and Linnea and doing my hair, no big deal. I was called out for gatekeeping a curling iron Is that right? A curling iron of all things? I know, I know it's crazy, wow, but there's other things we gatekeep as well. You know, sometimes things like a curling iron. It didn't even occur to us. But there's other tools and gifts that people have that they're afraid to share because they don't want people toshining them. Right, there's plenty of room for all of us.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, Absolutely, and we show up for different people as well. You know who. You know. Andy's community is different than Linnea's and mine's different from yours, Jen, and you know we just connect. I think that's the beauty of the Spoonie Sisters community is that we all come from different, diverse backgrounds. We all come from different walks of life and you know we're different ages and we can expand our awareness, send our messages, however we choose to do it, inspire each other, continue to empower each other, but we're all doing it in such a way that creates even more engagement, right, and really just reaching the people that relate to us, because everyone relates differently, right. So I think, with the competition again, I think it's around the mindset and how you are and where you are in that space.
Speaker 4:I would agree. I know personally for me I had a moment in my journey where I didn't get on social media quite as much and if I got on there I tried to watch things that weren't in our community because I got in a headspace that I felt I was being hard on myself because I wasn't able to do what other people were doing with the same disease. And sometimes early on in our journeys we think medicine, everything that we do for our bodies. When we first get diagnosed, we are all different. Everybody's disease acts different. But sometimes when you're newly diagnosed, newly in your journey, you don't realize that some of those people you see on the screen are not showing 24 hours of what their life is like. They're showing the good stuff.
Speaker 4:I think as newly diagnosed people you don't realize that because you're so caught up and so overwhelmed with everything that the doctor just gave you that you're seeing. Oh, that person has RA on the screen. Why am I not able to do that? Why am I not able to go bike riding for an hour? Why am I not able to do those things that they're doing? And it's because we get in our heads that the disease is the same for everybody. I think we need to share more, especially with our newly diagnosed people, that it's not a competition in our community. Everybody's journey is completely different, and I think that's something we really need to push a little bit more.
Speaker 1:I agree so much. I'm looking at three women that I love so, so much. I look up to each of you in different ways. You bring so much to my life, into the life of others, I couldn't even dream of feeling like I'm in competition with you. I want to cheer you on, I want to be your cheerleader, I want to see you do big, great things, and if there's some kind of knowledge or tool or gift that I can help you with, I'm going to do it. If you need me to make a graphic for you, I'm probably going to do it, because that seems like the right thing to do, I guess.
Speaker 3:It's because you like to tinker. Just be honest you like to tinker.
Speaker 2:I do.
Speaker 3:That is why you're our.
Speaker 4:Tinkerbell.
Speaker 2:Nothing wrong with tinkering.
Speaker 4:Yes, she's our Tinkerbell.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I love it. I love that. That is my new nickname. At the end of the day, that's what I do. I want to see what I can do to help, support you in the best way that I can, and maybe it is by tinkering and making something for you. Right, right we love your tinkering.
Speaker 4:She tinkered for me this morning and she made me the cutest Like. She tinkered for me this morning and she made me the cutest post for April Fool's. And I'm just like that girl. She's back at tinkering. She's off vacation, she's back and I missed it. I missed getting things where she's tinkering going. What do you think? What do you? So, as much as we tease her about it, it's her way of showing love to her friends. It's her way of supporting her friends and cheering you on to be as successful as possible.
Speaker 2:That is her gift to you, absolutely, and it brings her joy Exactly, and joy to us so.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much. We each have our own thing that brings us joy that we want to share with our communities, and we want to support our communities with and from what you were saying too, linnea. We all know we've all been rock bottom in our chronic illnesses and I can understand and relate to that person who might be listening now, thinking, going through all the guilt, going through the shame, going through the comparisons and feeling like they're being left out or whatnot, because when I was first diagnosed with dermatomyositis in 2002, I thought my world was crumbling. I thought I didn't know what was happening to me. All I knew was that I couldn't walk, I couldn't eat food, I was in a wheelchair before my diagnosis came around. So I was scared as hell. I was just in such a dark period in my life and I know how easy it is to sit there in pain and not be able to do the things that you're so used to doing. And looking at these stories and looking at these adventures that people with chronic illnesses are taking, you know that are a little bit more ahead in their journeys, but it's so hard not to go down that spiral, and so I think for that person, you know. I just want to say keep the hope, have that hope, lean onto your faith, lean onto the belief that you will rise up and that you will get to that point where you're going to start sharing your story and it might not be right now, but you, that you will get to that point where you're going to start sharing your story, and it might not be right now, but you are going to get to that place where we are, where we're being able to support the community and share the experiences that we need to share.
Speaker 2:And everybody is different, as you said. You know, we're all different. We're all at different stages in our chronic illnesses. I sometimes feel guilty, even now. As you know, I'm a volunteer with MSU and I'm one of the volunteers that is in a better place with my myositis. You know I have it managed and there's so many others in the community that are still struggling and it's very, very hard to show up sometimes because I start to feel that guilt, but it's it's. It's so important to let it go because at the same time, I'm giving them hope that one day they're going to be in my, in my shoes and they're going to start walking my shoes in my shoes as well. It's, it's a. It's a tough place to be. It's a tough place to be.
Speaker 1:I think that's one thing that's beautiful about you is you started your journey back in 2002, but look how far you've come and that's amazing. And so, therefore, you can share everything that you've learned, everything that's worked for you, everything that's helped you. You can share that within the community and you're someone that people can aspire to be like, and I hope you always remember that it's okay to show up. It's okay to show up even if you're doing better than others, because, at the end of the day, if we're comparing our journey to each other, yes, it can be easy to do, but we need that person to look up to.
Speaker 1:We need that person to give us hope, and you're the person that gives hope.
Speaker 2:And each one of us do it in our own unique ways, and I love that.
Speaker 3:Indeed. So, I have a question for you, ladies. Ooh, ooh Right, I have a question. It's a heavy hitter, right. Yeah, how do you navigate your perhaps feelings of jealousy, especially like early on in diagnosis? How did you navigate your feelings of jealousy toward the other person with the same condition that was doing things that you couldn't do? I struggled with that. That's a good question, I struggled with that for a very long time. Like we have the same diagnosis, why are you doing cartwheels and I'm not doing cartwheels?
Speaker 3:but, I was sitting in a space of. I am very much so jealous that your body still does the things. My body can't do the things. So what kind of things did you guys do to navigate that?
Speaker 1:I can start if you don't mind. Okay, my example is I knew a lady. We were starting a new church. We had only been there a few months when I woke up one day with my knee, causing all that pain, and before you know it, all my joints were hurting, right. Yeah, what I found out was this woman, she had RA, and I got joyful because I thought okay, I have someone that can tell me all the things she's going to tell me, what can help control this pain. She can give me all the advice.
Speaker 1:Well, it wasn't quite like that she was kind of a little more abrasive. She wasn't someone I felt comfortable going to and I've actually talked with my daughter about this recently. She just was not the kind of person that you could comfortably talk to and she would point you in the direction you need to go, and so that kind of made me angry and I kept thinking why is she doing so much better than I am? I am struggling to even walk and she's out there playing softball and doing all kinds of crazy things. What I had to remind myself was she was diagnosed years ahead of me.
Speaker 1:She had tried all the different things. She had found a combination of medication that helped her feel the way she felt, and so, unfortunately, I had no one to give me advice in the beginning. I had no one to help reframe my mindset. I unfortunately had to do that all on my own, and I'm glad I figured it out. But that's why I do what I do is because I want to help white people in a direction and help people to remember their life is not over. So that's my example. I don't know if that's really an answer.
Speaker 2:That's good and I think it's very similar and parallel to mine, because I didn't have MSU. You know, 20 plus years ago, you know MSU wasn't around, so there was no one there with myositis to help me and guide me through anything of it. It was all just brand new to me. Tma was around, but they were more on the research side of things and they didn't really have that great of support groups at that time. But I had to go down, I had to go spiral down. I had no choice that. I had to feel the uncertainty of my myositis and I had to go down that spiral in order to, okay, one day wake up and say I'm going to beat this. You know, I'm going to listen to my friends who are around me and being encouraging, wanting to take me out, but I just refused to go out, even in a wheelchair.
Speaker 2:I think by doing that built more resilience in myself and as I started a couple of years later, as I started to respond well to the medications that they were giving me, I started to come out from that. But I think that just letting yourself I started to come out from that. But I think that just letting yourself, allowing yourself to feel the sadness. The depression is what I call it. It was pretty much what I was in is a depression. I had to build from that and it wasn't easy. I think what truly brought me through that was when I decided to take some holistic courses on mindfulness practice, on mindset excuse me and around all the alternative care modalities that I really found fascinating. And once I was able to kind of get into that spectrum of care because at the time before I got sick I was actually on the PA list to go to the Pomona Physician Assistant Program.
Speaker 2:And once I got sick and started going in and out of hospitals, I decided that hospitals was not where I wanted to be. I didn't want to be in medicine, I needed to be somewhere else where I can help the community but in a more holistic way. And that's when I found mindfulness practice and all these different modalities that I got certified in and licensed in. But it really helped me to see and open myself up to letting go of all of that guilt and the shame, and it's always a practice.
Speaker 2:I still struggle, you know, as we all do. You know we struggle with guilt and shame and insecurities and things like that. But I'm in a better place now where these kinds of tools can help me along the way, and knowing that I have these tools and communities like my Spoonie sisters and MSU now, it's really all just kind of helped me build the resilience. I think we're all kind of learning our ways through our illnesses through these kinds of communities and there are more and more and they're encouraging for us to spread the awareness to other people and to those who are newly diagnosed. So I think for me really, just going back, I had to go to hit that rock bottom in that mindset way and go through all the emotions before actually opening myself up to the.
Speaker 4:When I was first diagnosed, there wasn't Instagram, tiktok, anything, it was just Facebook. I found a Facebook group and I really enjoyed it, but I realized in my journey it was depressing me because it was constant. I don't want to say complaining, because people were just asking for help, but every post was about how bad they were doing. As much as I cheered people on and talked to them as much as I could, it was starting to affect me. Moving forward, getting out of that space of thinking about how bad I am. Once I moved out of that space of thinking about how bad I am, once I moved out of that space and I found more chronically ill people, more people with RA, I found the people that were doing all those things I wasn't doing. I'm on a walker, I'm on a cane. I needed out of that negative space of just constantly gosh is that going to happen to me? Because that's what I was starting to do to myself in that group. That person's going through this with RA. Could it happen? Could I end up in the hospital for months like she did, and so I had to get out of there for my mindset?
Speaker 4:But then I was in this middle of not feeling I fit in anywhere. And then I got jealous of those seeing those videos of people going on these great vacations and hiking castles and doing all these things that right now I could not do. I had to remind myself that I seen a video of somebody and she talked about her journey, and she talked about the beginning of her journey. It all clicked and it was like, wow, so I can get there. I'm in the middle, I'm almost there.
Speaker 4:It might take me longer than it took them, but I fight that feeling all the time and within the last six months it feels like that feeling's getting smaller and smaller. Where I don't feel like that towards anybody, because now I'm watching and going. Look at them. Look what they just did because of RA, even despite RA. Look what they just did. So that's where my mindset is now. Do I get discouraged? Absolutely. Am I jealous? No, I'm cheering them on because they did it. They did it and I'll get there. I'll get there, I'll hike those high cast, so that that's just.
Speaker 2:I love it. I love it and you, Andy, for me.
Speaker 3:Well, see, that's the thing it's going to take you on a journey. I didn't actually start feeling supported until a few years back when I met Jen being diagnosed. There's nobody that wanted to talk about it in the military and I was in the boots when my diagnosis started happening. And I was in the boots when my diagnosis started happening and so for me, I was my. My anger and jealousy were hand in hand because I had people also in uniform telling me that I was faking. But it's because they didn't know what was going on and they hadn't done their research and they just assumed that I didn't want to do PT or I didn't want to come to work Not that I physically can't do those things anymore and that went on for about 16 years. It was she's lying, that's not happening and we're still going to deploy you and all the things. And I pushed through no support. So I was on deployments with no support, body hurting, like the whole thing was a whole. It was an entire how I had to pause my tongue because something bad almost came out crap show. It was a whole crap show of me just trying to find support. I think that my jealousy wasn't even geared toward other sick people. My jealousy was actually geared toward the able-bodied ones that just didn't see me like. Me changing physically, me changing mentally. My jealousy was like but why is it me and not you? I just want you to feel a little bit of it so that you can understand. Over the last five years, though, that support looks different, it's 100% not from a place of jealousy, it is. I have people that understand me and God's community is everything. Early in our diagnosis, we kind of isolate ourselves until we find our people. But I encourage people to find your people, because the isolation spirals you deeper, and that was what was happening to me. I was just spiraling deeper and darker and deeper and darker and then at one time I met Jesus, because I was still on the spiral, you know, and it wasn't until after that.
Speaker 3:After the, you have to sit down where I sat with myself and said what is this really over? What are you really angry about? Because at this point my root was that it's not that I couldn't do things, it's that the things that I did before look different in how I do them now. But I had to hit my literal rock bottom. I had to hit the floor for me to slow down and go. Okay, why is this really bothering you? Is it bothering you because you have to do it a different way? Or is it bothering you because you genuinely can't do it? And as I was going down the list of things, I realized it wasn't that I could not physically do the things. It's that my mind couldn't wrap its head around having to learn how to do it. They're here, guys. Uh, it's that my mind couldn't wrap itself around learning how to do it differently.
Speaker 3:I was more so intimidated with the new so I projected in anger and I projected in jealousy because I was so intimidated by what my new life looked like, because it was so unknown. It was like I don't know what tomorrow looks like. And everything that I had seen very similar to you, linnea, was every group that I had researched. It was like Debbie Downerville for realsies. I thought that I was on the brink of death before I had actually had the incident that made me meet Jesus. I thought I wasn't going to be able to walk or run or play volleyball.
Speaker 3:And my providers didn't make it easier, because when they give you the information, they kind of word vomit a whole bunch of words. But then go deal with this. Now for me, because I was a nurse I hear it and I immediately went to the worst case scenario because I treated patients that were the worst case scenario, so I knew how bad it could be. I never got to see how good it could be, but I always treated how bad it could be. And so now I'm on the side of how good it could be.
Speaker 3:And it really did change when my mindset changed, because your body keeps a score and you're holding all the stress. I was bottling and the more I bottled, the more I hurt, the more I spiral, the more I isolated. It wasn't until my mindset changed because I was around people that understood and I felt safe to go. Hey, I'm not okay, guys. And it wasn't a get over it or I don't understand what the big deal is.
Speaker 3:It was those comments like oh, can't you just push through it? Actually I can't. My body told me I can't. It's like they were at one point hearing it but not applying it. They were like, oh, this is just a one-time thing and you'll be fine next week. And they would ask the same question and I would still feel unsupported because the week changed, my conditions didn't, but I was no longer angry or jealous or whatever.
Speaker 3:It became more about education for me. No, my circumstances didn't change and here's why it's probably never going to change. Will it improve? Yes, will the diagnosis go away? No, so will you see me like this? Sometimes? Absolutely, and I need you to be okay with that. And the more people became okay with me going I need you to be okay with this because and the more people became okay with me going I need you to be okay with this because I can't change it the better my mind was and the better my body started to feel. But real quick to tell somebody to sit with you, take five minutes deep breathe, tap, do something, but sit with you and love you through it, because you teach other people how to love you and how to show up for you by how you love yourself and how you show up for yourself.
Speaker 3:Boundaries Didn't have them. Things oh, I'm off cusp again Didn't have them before I got sick. And I got sick, sick and isolated. Then I started having boundaries. My no was my no. I can't do it, I don't want to. Just no is a complete sentence, but that is yeah, my story was trash. It was trash. 16 years of trash, wow, wow.
Speaker 2:You said a word too that really kind of resonated with me was anger. You know, I think you know, when I first got sick that anger was there. It was just why me right, why am I 32 years old? I'm not able to do the things play tennis, do the softball things that I used to do? I was just so angry.
Speaker 2:I think we all go through those periods of grieving who we were right. I mean, we all talk about it and I don't think we talk enough about that grief, because sometimes those little peaks of grief are still sticking with us, right, and they still come up and we still have to process them. And they still come up and we still have to process them. But we're getting better as we're building our resilience to better navigate through our journeys. That anger is tough and I know how hard it is to process and get out from that mindset that, okay, there are people out there who can support us and who can guide us and who can empower us to do the right things and, to you know, keep going in our journey. So anger is huge and I'm glad you said that, but that's quite, quite a story and I think we all have our stories that are very similar, right, it's just having to.
Speaker 2:I think it's just the importance of communicating them, right? I think so many of us really need to come out and share your story. You know, tell your story, no matter how small, how big. I think it's so such an empowerful, a powerful tool for the healing process for us and then to help others and who can resonate and build up from that as well, just like we all have. You know, we all listen to other stories that have encouraged us and empowered us and inspired us. It's important to keep the awareness going, and I'm so glad that my Spanish Sisters is here and you know you girls are just doing an amazing, amazing job at doing just that and sharing the awareness, telling the stories, having the fun. You know you have to have fun. We have to have good laughs, right, Laughter is good medicine, so we have to have all the things. So thanks, girls.
Speaker 1:What is one tip or piece of advice that you would leave with someone that is newly diagnosed?
Speaker 2:Well, for me on the topic, it would be don't compare yourself to those out there right now. No comparisons. Focus on yourself. Focus on what's working for you, what is not working for you, focus on your healing journey for now. Listen to those who inspire you, but don't go down the scrolling. Don't go down that spiral of scrolling and comparing yourself, because you're very vulnerable right now. You're very scared, you're uncertain and you need to surround yourself with the people who do really get it and have been right where you are.
Speaker 3:I think my tip would be to take a pause. I love telling people to take a pause. Take a pause where you are. You have to understand it before other people can understand it. So handle yourself with care while you're trying to understand what just happened to you, how your life may change, but don't go down the rabbit hole of Google, and WebMD will give you all the things. If you're going to research, research from reputable sites, but give yourself a time limit to research. Don't spend all day researching, because you will come across the stuff that you're looking for and you're not.
Speaker 3:If you're going down the rabbit hole of research, the majority of the time people are not looking for the positive outcomes. When they're going down the rabbit hole of research, you're going to come across the thing that you were searching for. The worst case scenario. Ask yourself did you really want to know what is not happening to you, so that you're not planning your life around what the worst case scenario is? Because in the right now moment, acknowledge your right now. Right now, that's not you, and right now you can still do phenomenal things and your body is still allowing you to do those things.
Speaker 3:We allow our mind to change our belief system and our abilities, because we got this thing and the thing had a lot of letters and probably not not a lot of vowels, but it had a lot of letters that, in the form of a diagnosis, and we go.
Speaker 3:That means I have to stop. We immediately feel like, or go through life initially as if our bodies can't still do the things it was doing 15 minutes before we got the diagnosis. It's just that quick how quickly the mindset changes after you hear the thing and you've gone down the rabbit hole. You quickly erase the fact that all the way up until you got the diagnosis, you were doing all of these things and then we spiral. I can't do, because Google said and this is possibly going to be my outcome but 15 minutes before you walked into that doctor's office, you had done a lot of phenomenal things in a body that didn't play so nice with you. Love on. You Pause in a moment and sit in that, understanding that your body can still do some amazing things. Some amazing things, and it's not going to look the same, but it doesn't make it any less beautiful.
Speaker 4:I don't even know what to add, because they covered everything. I was kind of thinking about, like the research thing going down the rabbit hole. I'm telling you that's what I did because I had nobody that I knew in my life that had any chronic illness. So I literally didn't know where to go and I did start going down the rabbit hole and it took me to some very, very dark spots, very dark spaces, for longer than they should have. I should have been there, but I also think you have to. This is something Jen's told me ever since I've met her. I need to learn to give myself grace. You need to learn to give yourself grace.
Speaker 4:If all you did was get up out of bed and two meals, three meals then you accomplished something. If all you did was get up and do one load of laundry, you did something. Today, I think we forget, when we're sick, those little pieces. Just getting out of bed, even, and moving to a couch and laying down. You got up. That's a start. That's a start and it's okay. It's okay just to move from the bed to a chair, it's okay.
Speaker 4:But don't just know you're not alone, even though you feel like it. We are out here. We're this community, these women right here on this screen. We are out here and there's more like us. There's more like us that will cheer you on on your worst day and until I met Jen, just like Andy, I had the biggest cheerleader. She has always been one of my biggest cheerleaders, besides my husband and my children and my best friend Susan, but that was four cheerleaders. Finding Jen brought me to a whole cheerleading squad Like it's a whole squad now cheering me on. Even at my lowest moments I see you doing something and it's like I feel like they posted that for me, but in really, you guys posted it for everybody like me that needed it at the moment. So don't forget, you're not alone in this journey and we love you, no matter if we've met you or not. We got your back, that's all, sorry, we certainly do.
Speaker 1:So. My piece of advice is actually one little sneak peek out of the book, and it's let it go Never ruin a good day by thinking about a bad yesterday. That's brilliant, I love it. I think so often we get caught up in that. Yes, we do.
Speaker 2:We certainly do. I love that. I can't wait to get my hands on this book. Okay, do you ship to?
Speaker 1:Portugal. For you, I would do anything. Yeah, do you get?
Speaker 2:Amazon. We use Spain's Amazon.
Speaker 4:We can find out. If not, one of us will ship something to you. We don't care how long it takes.
Speaker 2:I encourage everybody out there as well to get your hands on this amazing journal. I know it's going to be wonderful and such a great tool to take on your journey. So congratulations again, Linnea, on this beautiful journal. Yes, I love it.
Speaker 4:I'm excited for Jen's because it's coming soon. Newly chronically ill people are going to get their have this information and they're going to be able to start this journey a little bit smoother because of her book. I can't wait to put it in the hands of people I know that just got newly diagnosed. I just can't wait for it With my journal too, ooh bundle, bundle package.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, I love it.
Speaker 4:Mindset.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, we're authors, jen. Yeah, that's so awesome. I'm actually working on my second collaboration right now with the last publications on my uh around my journey with myositis once again is on resilience. So, yeah, looking forward, yay, yes, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yes, I have one last thing. I want to remind people to compete in kindness. I know that sounds crazy. Compete in kindness instead of competing in suffering. So let's compete in who can be the most uplifting. We don't need to worry about being the best advocate or the strongest supporter, but be the kindest person. Be the kindest person you can be in the room. At the end of the day, the Spoonie community is stronger together. So how about we celebrate each other's wins, the big and the small, because every step forward for one of us is a big step for every single one of us.
Speaker 2:Amen to that sister I love you.
Speaker 1:I love you guys, we have to do this. I love our community Me too. I suppose we have to end, yeah.
Speaker 4:We'll have to have her on again.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes for sure, let's make a list of all the topics. Yes, until next time, don't forget your spirit.
