Dealing with Loss, Failure, and RA

Disappointment. Loss. Failure.

These are things that everyone has to deal with, but those who live with chronic illness and especially rheumatoid arthritis (RA) have a special relationship with those words. We fail more than that legendary "one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest" and, coincidentally, have similar issues with footwear.

Careers, relationships, hobbies – they all fall victim at 1 point or another to the tempest of chronic illness.

Failure and loss

Trying something and failing because your RA decides to rear its head is pretty much a rite of passage when you have a chronic autoimmune illness and not a good one either - like tossing your cap in the air at graduation or getting your picture taken with Santa by a snarky teenager in an elf costume. We all go through it and can take its toll on us mentally.

Everyone, healthy or otherwise, has to deal with loss and failure; but if you have RA or another chronic illness, it becomes more than just everyday living and it really hits home. It’s already tough to deal with the mental aspect of living with a chronic illness like rheumatoid arthritis, but when something happens that reminds you just how vulnerable you are, it can be enough to crush anyone – and that’s after just once or twice, not a lifetime.

RA seems to fight us at every turn

How do we keep on going when it seems like our illness is fighting against us at every turn like a slippery fish in a, errr, thing...that slippery fish...don’t like? Sorry, that one got away from me, but the metaphor I’ve used before is living with an angry RAccoon.

You try not to anger it but sometimes, even if you feed it delicious nuts and anchovies and pancakes or whatever the heck raccoons like to eat, it will still get mad. Furious, in fact – furious enough to prevent you from doing whatever you had planned and that always ends up hurting you in the long run.

Will I ever get to do anything that was my first choice?

Ever had to cancel a first date, or even reschedule? You might as well show up and tell her how you promised the judge you wouldn’t get caught stealing women’s underwear ever again and that’s how you got the job as a court reporter. It’s just about as effective as ensuring you’ll never see them again.

How about work? Ever try to explain to an employer that you are disabled and sometimes that means unexpected time off? You’d be better off telling them you just found out you were pregnant yesterday and plan to have 7 more kids. You can bet you’ll find that the position has suddenly "been filled."

This is usually how it goes when the angry RAccoon of failure rears its head and you are left with feelings of failure, depression, worthlessness, and dejection, wondering if you'll ever get to do anything at all that was your first choice.

How to mitigate the loss that comes with RA

Even if you haven’t experienced this sense of profound loss yet - and I hate to say it I really do, but you will - as the years with rheumatoid arthritis or whatever chronic illness you have mounted up, it gets more and more difficult to come through this life unscathed.

So, what do we do? How do we deal with the club of loss that seems to hit us over the head every time we heal from the last blow? Well, there is no surefire way to stop it from happening, but you can mitigate it.

Be prepared

First and foremost, just like the old Boy Scouts motto, “Be prepared.” It’s good advice in general for living with rheumatoid arthritis or any chronic illness really, but it’s especially useful for helping with loss.

What do I mean by be prepared? Well, for one, I always have at least an idea of a backup plan ready to go in case my first choice falls through. Work? Have an idea of what you might do should you get let go or, even worse, fired. Hobbies? Well, anyone can tell you I have so many different hobbies that my real hobby is literally having 100 hobbies. Boy, I said “hobby” a lot there.

Now, in love and relationships, you can’t really have a backup significant other ready to go, I mean, unless you are a total jerk - in which case, have at it. But for us regular non-celebrity folk, it’s not realistic. What you can do, though, is spend some time thinking about what you’ll do if you end up alone – whether it’s for a short time or a while, it’s good to have at least a vague idea of a plan in your head.

Your effort is valuable

Second, keep telling yourself that just because you failed to cross the actual finish line, that doesn’t mean the effort you put in is any less valuable.

Say you spent a ton of money and time raising a puppy into an adult. You train them, you feed them, you love them, and you taught yourself everything from scratch. Then, you have to move to an apartment that doesn’t take pets so you give the dog to the police academy or some other useful endeavor. Does that mean all the time, love, and training you put in now amounts to nothing? Is it worthless? No, of course not. So why should it be any different with anything else?

If you try to get a certain job and it doesn’t work out because of your RA, it doesn’t mean the entire endeavor was fruitless; it just means that that particular part of the plan didn’t come to fruition. You just have to keep reminding yourself of that.

Failure and loss are a big part of living with chronic illness and RA, and it takes a toll but if you do your best to mitigate it, you can learn to deal with it enough so it doesn’t destroy you every time. Talk soon.