In 2013, I contracted a virus that I thought was the flu. It ended up being dengue, sometimes referred to as “breakbone fever.” The nickname is a reference to the levels of pain some people experience when they are in dengue’s throes. I expected my symptoms to subside once the active infection went away. After all, friends who contracted dengue, sometimes multiple years in a row, seemed to return to a sense of normalcy. Instead, the joint pain remained, below the fever pitch of “breaking bones” but nowhere near my old self. For a long time I waited for that “old self” to materialize, and for the pain to recede. It took three years to finally surrender to my present and admit that the pain isn’t going anywhere.
-Jodi Ettenberg quit her job in 2008 to travel the world, and for years she has written about her adventures at Legal Nomads. She now reveals her battle with chronic pain and how it forced her to make changes.
from Longreads https://blog.longreads.com/2016/10/25/chronic-pain-fatigue-and-my-new-normal/
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