Living with a Chronic Illness Made Me A Feminist

Autoimmune diseases affect approximately 8% of the population, but 78% of those who live with these conditions are women. I’m one of those women.

At first, I went to great lengths to hide that fact. I came up with ridiculous excuses whenever I had to bail on a hangout because I was too scared to tell people that my treatments create scheduling conflicts. I resisted being branded as “that sick girl,” so I put on red lipstick and wore a leather jacket to class so no one would suspect I’d just walked back from a debilitating infusion.

Then I learned the above statistic — that women are disproportionately affected by these diseases. I realized it was helping no one to stay silent about yet another epidemic disproportionately affecting women, and I decided that I was done pretending that everything was fine. I felt the responsibility to speak out.

But when I finally opened up about what I was going through to people in my life, I was met with: “But you look great! It’s obviously not that bad.” Multiple ER visits, a surgery, daily medications, and being a regular at the hospital because of a rare autoimmune disease no one has heard about were apparently “not that bad” because that experience wasn’t immediately visible on my body. In those moments, my invisible battle was invalidated, but I refused to let a misogynistic remark about my appearance invalidate me.

Advocating for social change requires recognizing that the very things we’re afraid of being perceived as actually make up our arsenal. I decided to turn everything that wasn’t fine about my life into what makes it special. That’s how my book, Dealing with Dramedies came to be. I reflected on the many times I almost died before turning 19 while I was hooked up to an IV. With a morbid sense of humor and a good group of friends, I finally found the confidence to be a real feminist — to unapologetically speak my truth and have the guts to stop contributing to the stigma surrounding women’s health by participating in the silence that surrounds it.

I was inspired along the way by people like Lady Gaga, who has opened up about her fibromyalgia, Selena Gomez, who advocates for lupus, and Taylor Swift and Jameela Jamil, who have spoken about their eating disorders. I then realized that being a celebrity isn’t a prerequisite for inspiring others. I don’t want another person living with a chronic illness to feel like their lives are going to waste. To them I say: You’re not defined by what you’re going through, but you will be defined by what you choose to make of it.