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When Your Chronic Illness Leaves You Housebound

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Life can hold  many wonderful adventures.

Travel, work, days out, drives in the countryside, eating at wonderful restaurants and cafes, visits to family and friends.

The list is endless. The opportunities to broaden your horizons are plentiful.

What if  you can’t do any of those things? What if you are housebound? What if your body is incapable of being out for longer than an hour a day, in fact only an hour every few days, on a good week, all being well?

What does life look like then?

What if the four walls of your home are your boundaries? What if looking out the window at a beautiful sunny day is the extent of your outlook?

What does life look like then?

For many people with chronic disease, life’s limitations are severe. Finding light and life, within the compounds of their home, is perhaps one of the keys to survival. Perhaps finding such joy in the home is the key to a happy existence, in what would otherwise feel like a prison sentence.

I am often asked how I cope not being able to get out.

Comments such as, “I wish you were able to do more,” or, ” I would love to see you get to a cafe or spend a day out,” are said with true love and concern from friends who want to fix the what can’t be fixed.

I want to reassure my friends and those who are living with severe chronic illness, that a fulfilled and happy life can be found in the confines of your home.

“Home sweet home.” I love my home. It offers me security. It offers me comfort both physically and spiritually.

It is the place where I rest. The place where I laugh. The place where I cry. The place where I pray. The place where I sing. The place where I muse with my friends on my phone.

It’s the place where I am enveloped by the love and care of my beautiful husband. It’s the place where I write. The place where I think.

It’s the place where I eat. It’s the place where I sit outside in the garden and admire the beautiful flowers and where butterflies and birds visit me.

“Home sweet home” is my world. It is a beautiful place and I love it.

I am content within it. I nurture it. I care for it. I potter in it. I express myself in it through interior decor that reflect the things I love.

It is my artwork and it brings me joy to be within it and surrounded by it.

The walls do not suffocate me. They allow me to live life as full as possible in a safe place.

It is priceless. It is life giving. It is my refuge. It is my “home sweet home!”

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Thinkstock Image By: Max5799

Originally published: May 25, 2017
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