What’s it really like to live with chronic health problems every day? How do you deal with the physical symptoms, emotional turmoil and practical problems? In this interview series, real life ‘spoonies’ share their experiences and tips.
Charis is a twenty-something business management student from Singapore. On Chronically Charis, she chronicles her journey with Fibromyalgia and shares how to live intentionally with chronic illness.
Tell us a little about yourself.
Hi my name is Charis! I’m from sunny Singapore and I run the blog www.chronicallycharis.com where I write about my journey with Fibromyalgia. I’m in my early twenties and I’m currently a full-time student in business management. I love food, makeup, yoga, and travel and when I’m not resting in bed you’ll find me discovering delicious(and gluten-free) food about town 🙂 If you want to follow my misadventures with chronic illness, do check out my blog and follow me on Instagram at @chronicallycharis.
When did you first get sick?
I’ve been sick pretty much half my life now! It’s scary to say it out loud but honestly, it hasn’t been that bad. I first started feeling really tired and getting fevers and aches all the time when I was about 14/15 but my doctors just thought it was “stress” or “growing pains”. As I grew older, the symptoms started to get worse and I developed a lot of stomach problems, even necessitating a hospitalization. Much later, I discovered that my stomach problems were actually gluten and lactose intolerances, which many people with fibromyalgia have. After many trips to see specialists, a rheumatologist finally diagnosed me with fibromyalgia. It’s a diagnosis of omission (I tested negative of Rheumatoid Arthritis and Lupus which quite a few doctors suspected my disease to be at first) but to be perfectly frank, it was a huge relief to know that my disease had a name instead of thinking it was all inside my head!
