Chronic illness acceptance isn't giving up
And it's not toxic positivity either
Acceptance and healing aren’t opposites.
Let me say it again a little louder.
ACCEPTANCE AND HEALING ARE NOT OPPOSITES.
You can be working on your treatment plan, trying new medications, seeking new specialists, and still accept yourself and your illness exactly as you are.
Somewhere along the way, we all lost the plot.
We let the drive for perfectionism—the never-ending pursuit to be better, be different, be somewhere where the grass is greener—take over. We got on a treadmill with no off button, consciously or subconsciously, rather than stand on solid ground, where we get to choose when to stay put and when to take steps forward.
Somehow* we all lost the plot.
*And obviously by somehow I am refraining from getting into a full rant about ableism, fear-based marketing tactics that prey on our insecurities and health issues, or even how America’s Next Top Model probably ruined the body image of an entire generation?
I think acceptance is joyful
Acceptance as joyful is not toxic positivity. I am allergic to toxic positivity and break into spiritual hives at its pervasiveness in our culture—especially when it comes to how to and not to deal with illness and pain. I believe in moving through the big emotions like grief, fear, and shame—not skim past them like many of you probably do the words of this newsletter (it’s ok, it’s ok)—because that’s how you get to the good stuff.
I think of acceptance as joyful because it exists purely because we allow ourselves to recognize and move through the big emotions. You cannot reach acceptance until you are in loving conversation with the big, scary emotions, not treating them like an ex you’re trying hard to maintain a healthy coparenting relationship with.
Chronic illness acceptance is the process of moving through the big emotions, getting them out of your body, and reaching the other side. A side where you have room to breathe, emotional and mental space to just be, and energy to remember what makes you yourself and what makes you smile.
How do you get there?
I want to walk you through the Joyful Acceptance Method (see visual below) we’ll be working through in Believe Your Body. This is the framework I created from what helped me reach genuine acceptance of my body and my life with illness, and it’s the backbone of what I use with 1:1 clients.
The Joyful Acceptance Method is a process and it's not linear. But together these four steps will help you trust yourself. And trusting yourself is what allows you to live your life joyfully, illness included.
It has four steps:
Grieve what’s been lost
Grief is sneaky. In this step you learn what grief sounds like for you specifically, how it impacts your life, and how to move through it skillfully without overwhelming yourself.Acknowledge and accept your reality
As we’ve mentioned, acceptance isn’t giving up and it’s not toxic positivity. In this step you uncover what acceptance actually looks like for you, what’s been making it difficult, and how to start moving toward it in a way that sticks.Understand and advocate for your needs
Advocacy is harder than it looks! I’m sure you know this. In this step you strengthen your capacity to understand what you actually need and communicate it clearly, to yourself and others.Reconnect to joy and self-trust
This step is about following what genuinely lights you up. Following that joy is what allows you to rebuild trust in yourself and your body.
What this looked like in my own life
When I look back at my own experience with illness, I can see these steps clearly.
Facing my grief in grad school was a major tipping point. I applied for my PhD because I wanted to be a professor. My health made that impossible. So for a long time I felt lost. I was still functioning, still moving forward, still trying to figure out my next path, but carrying this unnamed weight I hadn't let myself fully feel yet.
Once I named it as grief, things started to shift. I had to recognize the specific thoughts that kept surfacing—why me? what will I even do without this path? can I still be happy?—and learn to hold space for them slowly over time while staying within my window of tolerance (a skill we’ll discuss in the course).
Because once I could sit with the grief without drowning in it, I could start to acknowledge my reality. My body had limits. Accepting those limits—like actually not pretending I was all fine—is what allowed me to start understanding my needs.
For a long time I didn’t know what I needed when symptoms came up. Every flare turned me into an anxious little mess ball. Learning how to create safety in my body, trust my body, and speak to it kindly helped me understand what I actually needed, and eventually gave me the language to communicate that to other people.
And once I could understand what I needed, I had space to reconnect to joy and self-trust.
Creativity was my pathway to joy and self-trust. I started out small, just doodling for 5 minutes a day. Then I got bigger, writing music again. Then I got HUGE, publishing my creativity publicly.
What I know now that I didn’t know then: self-trust is what unlocks joy in your body. Not the absence of symptoms. Not being fixed. Trust. Because without it, joy gets robbed by self-doubt, second-guessing, and self-gaslighting.
For you: Can you skillfully move through grief when it shows up? Are you ready to accept your body and your reality? When you’re flaring, do you know what you need? Do you know what joy feels like in your body?
Are you ready to trust yourself? Your body? To do life with symptoms?
If yes, that’s exactly what we’re doing in Believe Your Body: Stop Doubting Your Chronic Illness Symptoms & Reconnect with Self-Trust starting April 12th.
Each week we'll move through the Joyful Acceptance Method together, but the JAM is just the larger method. Within each step I'll be sharing additional frameworks that I’ve either created or found useful to help you at whatever stage you’re currently at.
We're going to have a genuinely good time doing some genuinely hard work accepting ourselves—which isn’t giving up ;).
I’d love to have you there. Pay what you can structure: $65, $125, $165 USD.
🌻 You have four days left to sign up for a chance to win a free 1:1 coaching session with me.
Sending lots of love for joy and healing always <3,
Dr. Talia
P.s. Do you like the Joyful Acceptance Method visual? Did it help?
Ready to believe my body!
Interestingly, I usually associate toxic positivity with a LACK of acceptance — "everything's fine! I'm doing great!"
When I accept that everything is NOT in fact fine, I am met with the big emotions that come with that realization, which allow me to process them and come back to center.
This is the actual meaning of nervous system regulation. Great post!
This was a comfort to read; I went through this journey about a year and half ago after I had my second surgery for Stage 4 Endometriosis. The 2 years prior to that I had lost so much of life, had to pause my career, and ended up in a legal battle. What I needed to do to accept and find joy again required so much strength it's hard to put into words. But the more we share, the more we move our stories into the mainstream, I believe the more we can move society (and the broken systems that do not serve us well) into seeing the reality of life when chronically ill. 💚