Invisible Conditions

Trigeminal Neuralgia is an invisible condition.

One of the most difficult aspects of living with Trigeminal Neuralgia is that it cannot be seen by people. "Can someone really be in so much pain, but have no visible signs?”

Many people need evidence, something visible, something tangible, before they can truly believe that someone could possibly be living with such cruel and savage pain. After all, if it were really that bad, doctors would have found a cure by now. Wouldn’t they?

Sadly, it is that bad, and even more sadly, there really isn’t a cure.

When there is no understanding, it affects the patient so much.

They feel like they are not believed. They feel guilty because of their inability to live life as they should. They feel like failures, as they cannot live up to their own or other people’s expectations. They feel that they need to hide their pain from others. They feel more and more isolated with their pain. They become depressed. And it becomes even more difficult to deal with the pain.

This is not just related to Trigeminal Neuralgia.

There are many invisible conditions.

Can we tell if they have an invisible condition?

Can we tell if they are ill?

Can we tell if they are depressed?

Can we tell if they are grieving?

Can we tell if they are being bullied?

Can we tell if they are struggling financially?

Can we tell anything about a person simply by looking at their face?

Of course, we can’t tell any of those things just by looking at someone's face.

But we, as humans, tend to judge too readily.....even those of us who believe ourselves to be non-judgmental. We all do it.

We notice the grumpy looking shop assistant and think they could do with smiling a bit more. We don’t wonder why they are grumpy. We don’t really give a thought to what they may be going through. We possibly don’t even care.

We see a car pulling into the disabled parking space and notice the driver getting out and walking unaided into the supermarket and presume he isn’t disabled at all and shouldn’t be parking there. We don’t give a thought that by the time he has finished his shopping, he possibly will be struggling to walk from the checkout back to his car. We just think he was wrong to park in that disabled space.

We hear so much on television and newspapers about people fraudulently claiming disability benefits, that when our young, healthy looking neighbour hasn’t been working for six months, we presume they are lazy and work-shy. Do we even entertain the thought at all, that this healthy looking young man, may actually be suffering greatly in some way? Depression? Anxiety? Living with invisible pain like Trigeminal Neuralgia?

Perhaps we all need to take another look at those faces.

Perhaps we need to imagine a large question mark on their foreheads to remind ourselves that much of what goes on in life is actually invisible.

Nobody likes to be judged.

Perhaps a little more compassion and empathy could make everyone’s lives a little better. 

Please help to bring awareness about Trigeminal Neuralgia and other Invisible Conditions by sharing our blog. Awareness can bring much needed understanding.

Trigeminal Neuralgia : More To It Than Pain

Trigeminal Neuralgia is a horrendous, painful condition. There can be no arguing about that. However, there is so much more to living with a condition like this than just the pain.

Dealing with any chronic illness can be soul destroying. Life can change so much. Relationships change, and sometimes sadly fall apart. People often can't continue to work, which can bring financial problems, which then bring on more worries.

So many aspects of life can become affected by chronic illness.

Emotionally, living with chronic pain can be overwhelming. People often say they feel sick and tired of feeling sick and tired. How true that saying is. Pain from a condition like Trigeminal Neuralgia can also be incredibly isolating. People often feel so very alone with their pain feeling that nobody understands, and often, that people who should care, don't. That in itself can bring about problems within relationships and lead to serious insecurities.

Then there's the fatigue. It's not just a tiredness which can be shaken off after a good night's rest. People living with pain can become tired, physically and mentally. It can be emotionally draining.

People can become frustrated and exasperated by what their illness does to them. They want to be able to lead the life they had before, but the pain just will not allow them to do so. They can feel despair and hopelessness when treatments don't work, and they can begin to lose hope that anything can help.

Panic, anxiety and fear are three emotions which nearly every chronic pain sufferer lives with. These emotions could stem from worrying about their job or how to pay bills. Could be worrying in case the pain will get in the way of a family celebration. Or it could simply be worrying about what the future holds. Sometimes, living in fear of pain can be as bad, and controlling, as the pain itself. Even people who have pain remissions probably worry every day in case their pain returns.

People can get impatient, snappy, and often  irritated about things which would never have mattered before. Possibly even over-sensitive. A joke, or a funny comment may not seem so funny to someone living with pain.

They can feel bitter and resentful at the changes in their lives. They may feel like a failure, feel worthless, feel they are a bad parent, spouse, son, daughter, sibling etc. They often feel that they just can't cope with this new situation they are in. Life can seem so unfair at times…….

Depression can easily take hold.

This drawing has been used with kind permission from the artist Michel EL Hachem
More of his art can be viewed on his Facebook Page or his Devian Art page

Probably everyone, whether living with pain or not, has experienced some of those emotions from time to time. But when living with chronic pain, these emotions can sometimes take over. It becomes an effort to do anything. It can become easier just to disappear into their own world, because the pain is too much. Too much to deal with and too much to explain.

All of those emotions are completely normal. But, we do have to try to change what we can so that those negative emotions are not allowed to drown us. We need to learn to ask for help and support. We need to be 100% truthful, especially with our doctors. They need to know how we are emotionally so they can try to treat us as a whole person, not just to try to treat the pain.

Nobody should ever be ashamed or embarrassed to admit how they are feeling. Admitting it is very often the way to move forward. There is help out there and there are people who understand. Everyone needs a good support network. But sadly, not everyone has that. Sometimes online support groups are a person's only real support. These are often run by people in the very same situation, so they do understand, and often, together, they can find a way to help one another.

If you are feeling like this, please reach out for support and help. Don't let depression eat away. The further you go down, the harder it can be to climb back up, so it is important to reach out for help sooner, rather than later.

Living with chronic pain can mean a lot of learning. 'Learn to accept' are three very easy words to say, but accepting this pain is far from easy. However, accepting doesn't mean that we have to like the change, but by accepting it, it can be a bit easier to find ways of coping with it. Learning to realise what we are capable of, so we don't set goals that are too high. Learning to realise when we need to rest. Learning to relax. Learning to make the best choices. Learning to make priorities. Learning what is right for ourselves. And possibly most importantly, learning to ask for help when we need it.

A Face Behind The Pain

Facial pain can come in various forms and have various causes.

One cause of the pain can be injury to the facial nerves. Perhaps a fall or a car accident cause an injury which leaves lasting damage.

Shelley, a TN sufferer in Canada, was at a baseball game when she was accidentally hit on the face by the baseball.

The result was shocking.

With thanks to Shelley for allowing us to use her photos

As the days passed, the bruising came out. Shelley's face was black, blue and a multitude of other colours.

She was in extreme pain.

People saw her and knew she was in extreme pain. The bruising allowed people to understand.

Nobody would have looked at her and thought, "there's nothing wrong with her", "why doesn't she just take a couple of painkillers?", "what is she complaining about?" or, perhaps worst of all,  "she doesn't look sick!"

Everybody who saw Shelley's face could tell the pain she was in. People could comprehend the agony.


However, bruises fade…...


Shelley's face soon turned back to normal. But, sadly, the damage to the nerves was permanent. The bruises were gone, but the pain remained, possibly even became worse.

Constant aching, burning, agonising pain….along with the emotional issues which go hand in hand with chronic illness.

Shelley became a sufferer of an extremely painful, but invisible condition. A condition which can take over a person's life. A condition which non-sufferers, including many doctors, find extremely difficult to comprehend.

If only people could see our invisible bruises, surely they would understand the pain.

There is no cure (at the moment) for trigeminal neuralgia or similar facial nerve pain. When nerves are injured, they are often damaged beyond repair. We all live in the hope of a cure, but until such time, we desperately need people to understand.

We need hope, we need support, we need understanding.

Our job as sufferers, is to try to make people understand the pain we live with. We must explain it in a way to make people at least try to understand.

End TN made a video last year called "Faces Behind the Pain" in the hope that non-sufferers could 'see' our pain. We don't want to shock people, or scare them, but we do want and need people to understand how painful Trigeminal Neuralgia is, how demanding living with this constant pain is and how frustrating and depressing life can become.

You may also want to go here to our Facebook awareness page to read the individual stories from the people who took part in this video.

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How do you make people understand your pain? We'd really like to know. How do you describe it? Have you ever tried to 'draw' your pain to let family and friends, or even doctors, understand? Please let us know by either commenting here, or by contacting us through our Awareness Page or Support Group on Facebook.

We put this poster on to our awareness page on Facebook a couple of weeks ago.

Unless people are in the position of having an ongoing illness, or caring for someone with one, they possibly have no idea just how much online communities mean.

No matter what time of day or night, there is normally somebody available for a chat. This is so important when you live with certain conditions. Sometimes people can become quite down, even severely depressed, and the knowledge that having someone there is invaluable.

Someone once wrote that online communities are just one big pity party. But nothing could be further from the truth.

Some people do need to have a bit of a moan, and to be able to do that to people who understand. It is a way of coping. But there are people who are constantly trying to help, trying to pull them through their down spell.

Where would we be without those social networking sites?

TN is often seen as a condition with no cure and  no hope, but hopefully with online groups, people can get support and help. And until there is an actual End to Trigeminal Neuralgia, we'll be thankful for the invention of the internet.