When I Say "I Feel Better Today"

When someone with chronic illness and chronic pain says 'I feel better today' or 'I am having a good day', it is not an all-encompassing *better*. It does not mean that every single symptom is better - in fact, it usually means that some symptoms are worse in order for others to be improved. 

'Feeling better' or 'having a good day' usually means that a particularly volatile symptom that has been plaguing a patient long-term has settled just a little bit. 

There are lists of symptoms that will never fully disappear. They go through cycles of mild/moderate/severe, at unexpected times, and often each symptom is on its own calendar. Everything is a trade-off. Everything is a compromise. 

When I, personally say "I feel better today", maybe it is because my nausea has improved. Not that I have no nausea, but that the nausea - which had been SEVERE for over 6 years - is now to a mild/moderate level on a daily basis. It is not gone, but it has lessened enough for me to do things like having showers without vomiting. 

It could also mean that my energy levels are better, or my fatigue has improved. Again, not because these symptoms have disappeared, but because for the past 8 years these symptoms have made me feel like a shell of myself, and I have gained a small margin of that back. A small margin is huge for me. 

So when other people say that they feel better, try to remember that it doesn't mean that they feel well. I will always feel ill, usually extremely ill, so small margins make a large difference to my quality of life. Others are often in the same overall situation. When one symptom feels improved, there are another 5 symptoms that have not improved or have gotten worse. It's this constant balancing of these symptoms that make managing chronic illness so complicated.