The duality of life with a chronic illness.

“I mean, it’s all psychological really – have you thought about booking in some more cognitive behavioural therapy?”

“Are you overdoing it at the moment? How often do you go out drinking?”

“The issue is, Dayna, you really do seem fine and chatty.”

These are just a few of the hundreds of disheartening sentences I’ve had from medical professionals in the decade since I was first diagnosed with myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME).

ME is a long-term condition that can affect different parts of the body, with the most common symptom recognised as extreme tiredness that is not relieved by rest. Other key symptoms include sleep problems, chronic pain and intense brain fog.

At just 22 years old I’d started taking ‘funny turns’ – suddenly struggling to stay awake, sleeping in toilets just to get through my work day as my body screamed like I hadn’t slept for weeks, despite getting almost 12 hours of sleep a night. Unsurprisingly, I struggled to keep a job during this period in my life.

I’d be fine one moment and then suddenly feel a wave of fatigue hit out of nowhere – I’d become confused and delirious, often having to sit down wherever I was in order to avoid being a risk to myself. There were days at university where I had no choice but to go home, as I staggered about the halls feeling like my body was about to collapse.

And then there was the pain – the crushing, burning pain that made my joints feel like they were set alight, despite having barely walked the length of myself some days.

The scariest thing? As I was slapped with a diagnosis of ME, I was simultaneously told that what I was experiencing........

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