 Hi, it's been a while. I've actually forgotten how to film. I was setting up today and I was like, wait, what do I do? And then I put way too much makeup on. I've worn this much makeup in a long time. I don't know if I'm gonna leave this video up or not. I know people say that. They're like, I might delete this and it's kind of click baity or whatever, but I might privatize this video. I'm not sure. This is hard because I'm uploading this and I don't know if anyone's gonna see it. I don't know the people who do see it are gonna understand it. So I feel like I almost have to introduce myself. I'm Shnady Katie. This is the makeup chair and I used to upload a lot on this channel and just be online in general, to be honest. A few years ago, I was diagnosed with an illness. I mean, I'd already had it my whole life, so it wasn't that much of a shock. I was kind of relieved to actually get diagnosed, but in the last year or so, it's gotten so much harder and so I had to take time off. And I thought about not doing this because I was like, I don't think anybody really cares. I was thinking that in my head. I was like, I don't think anybody cares, Shnade. But I'm doing it for two groups of people. The first group is the people who have been so supportive. I'll talk to them in a second. The second group is for the people who have a chronic illness, who feel alone and invisible, particularly if you have an invisible illness, how difficult that is and I kind of, that's why I wanted to do this video. Originally, I just thought I was just gonna jump back into just doing tutorials and I wanna show you guys I'm cleaning out my makeup room and I wanted to kind of do decluttering videos and all that kind of stuff. I thought, oh, maybe I should probably talk about why I've been gone. And if it makes somebody feel less alone, then that would be great. Cause that's one thing for me is I've been going on TikTok. I have a TikTok but I haven't uploaded anything on TikTok. But I've been going on TikTok and I find people who have a similar issue and similar illnesses and stuff and just hearing them talk, it really helps me feel less alone in all of this. So I thought I'd do a video which kind of talking about like why I've been gone and where I've been gone and the reality of having an illness and trying to live a life. The other group of people that I wanna do this for is the wonderful people who have been so kind and so loving and supportive and checking in on me. I am so sorry I have not got back to you. It has been really hard to come online at all. At like, I haven't been on Instagram in the last, I don't know how many months. I think I've opened Instagram maybe three times. I have been avoiding YouTube altogether and that's kind of why I haven't replied to anybody and got back to people. It's really hard to see people doing what you have always done and love to do that you can't do. I guess it's like, have you ever like sprained your ankle, you know, at, I don't know, basketball training and then, you know, your team is like in the final. It's hard to watch. It's kind of bittersweet, you know? And that's kind of what it's like for me. I've been kind of avoiding coming online and I know that people have been messaging Davey as well, who is my angel, he's amazing. And so he's kind of been letting me know what's being said and I appreciate it so much. Never expected that. And I really appreciate it. Oh, we're getting real real. So thank you for the people who have been still contacting me and still watching and supporting and checking in on me. And thank you for not putting any pressure on me. You've been so kind that you've been like, we'll be here whenever, just make sure you're okay. And I feel honored and very blessed that anybody cares that much. And the thing is I also want to say is I've really been talking to my friends. I've been kind of avoiding going online or avoiding my phone. It's not good. I'm kind of getting back into it now. I'm like, okay, I need to actually communicate with people and talk to people. But it's just been, it's been real hard. My illness got really bad and I had to make the decision to take some time off. It sounds like really dramatic and stuff. But I want to explain the whole role that working and stuff plays in your life. People take it for granted and they even hate work. And I have days when I don't like my job as well, but being able to be independent and work is so, it should never be taken for granted because not being able to do it has just been so difficult. And I know there's so many people at the moment who've really, their job's been taken away from them with everything that's gone on. They haven't been able to do the thing that they love. And even the musicians, like Davey's a musician, luckily he's able, you know, he's slowly starting to pick up and he's able to gig again. But having that thing that makes you who you are doesn't necessarily have to define you, but anything that you do, that being taken away from you out of your own control is so difficult. I've been so angry and upset and frustrated at the fact that there's so much I haven't been able to do. And I don't want to sit here and complain. I actually just want to explain what it's like. And I know that I'm like, I'm all glam and people, people don't see it. And so I feel so, I feel invisible in the world because I can't do stuff. But then I also, I feel invisible in the fact that people don't know, they don't look at me and they don't realize how much I am trying so hard. And that's the thing with, I think of invisible illnesses. People go, well, they don't look sick. They look fine. They look okay. I think she's just exaggerating. And that's been my biggest fear is that anybody would think that I was exaggerating. All I want to do is just live a normal life and do normal things. I went to the supermarket two days in a row because I forgot something. And it was really hard. I was absolutely exhausted and sick afterwards, just for going to supermarket twice. And I'm not crying about that. I'm crying about the fact that like, these are simple things that we all, and I used to take for granted that I used to be able to do, that I'm really struggling to be able to do. I lost such independence in myself. And to lose that was so hard to rely on anybody. I don't even like somebody making me toast, even though Davey makes very good toast. He butters right to the edge and it's delicious. Usually I'm so lazy, I just like put butter on in the middle and just it'll spread itself. But he liked it like perfectly. But yeah, again, I don't like people doing anything for me. I like being independent. I like doing stuff. And it's been so hard to say, actually I need help. And I think one of the hardest things was losing the ability to work and create videos. That's been one of the hardest things because that's all me. And so people have been able to help me in like different aspects, but this is me, I do everything. I don't have an editor. I don't have anybody. I don't have a manager or anything like that. It's all me. And so if that thing is gone, I really felt really low in myself. And I really want to fight really hard to hold on to as much independence as I can for as long as I can. But it is terrifying. For those of you who don't really know what JHS is, it's a joint hypermobility syndrome, but it affects like everything from my skin to my blood vessels, you know, every cell in my body. It also just means that sometimes my joints are sore, but then I have also pots that affects my blood pressure. And so I have ridiculously low blood pressure and I have these drops that come out of nowhere and I can't move and I can't speak for about 10 minutes. It's hard when I'm in public because I hide it. I don't like people to realize. They probably just think I'm being a bit maybe moody or grumpy or something, but there's a battle going on in my body at all times. I never fully go unconscious when I have my drops compared to other people that do. So I feel lucky in that sense. Couple of times I've been on the edge, but mostly I just can't move or speak and I'm just trapped in my body and it's scary. I laugh about it because it makes it easier to kind of even talk about it. Sometimes I just want to run away. This is me being super honest here. I'm being really raw and real here. This is really hard. I said it to Davey recently. I was really upset and struggling. And I said, I said, I just want to run away. And he said, where do you want to go? You know? And I was like, I want to run away from this because my body is failing me. And I want to run away from it. Oh, I shouldn't be crying because this is so silly. You know? This is just the reality of it. I feel embarrassed because so many people have it so much worse than me and I should not be crying over this. But I also have to tell myself that it's okay to be upset and to feel disappointed. People think that people who have illnesses are like brave, but they don't realize how hard it is to keep going. Whether it's your mental health or your physical health, it is hard to keep fighting every day and you just want a day off. I had one day, two and a half weeks ago, where I was okay. It was amazing. I was laughing at how good I felt, but it was only one day. But I take it. I, oh, do I take that day? I'm not gonna upload this video if I'm like this because people are gonna think I'm crying like a big baby. You know what? I don't care because I'm gonna be really raw. I'm really honest here. And just say it is, it's hard. And you know, sometimes you just want someone to say, not you're brave and keep going, but you just want someone to say, you know what? That really sucks because it does. Cause there's just this, you know, war going on inside me. And some days I wake up and I'm like, oh, I don't have the strength today. But there were some days when I feel like my body is shutting down and I'm terrified to go to sleep. And I wake up in the morning and I'm so relieved that I'm awake. And I know I'm not the only one to feel that way. I read from a few people who literally sit in their car outside A&E because they're worried that their body is shutting down, but because they've had every test and all that kind of stuff, they don't go in. I'm lucky in the fact that my illness has been diagnosed. So I know what it is and I can explain away my symptoms. I know what causes them. I know what I have to do to stop them, even though sometimes I feel like I'm doing everything right and you still get hit by a flare up, you know? And you're like, wait a minute, I did everything right. I've been doing everything right for a month. Why do I feel like this? And sometimes you just kind of go, oh, I don't even care anymore. I'm going to eat what I want and I'm not going to sleep properly. And I'm not going to do my exercise and I'm just going to do what the hell I want because sometimes it doesn't even matter. Like, how hard did you try? You can't have control over when you're going to have flare ups, you know? And at least maybe you have a bit of a fun day if you broke the rules a little bit. And I'm lucky that I have been diagnosed because there's so many people that haven't been and that waiting game is so hard and you feel crazy. I feel crazy and I know that I have this illness that even some days I'm like, is this in my head? But the thing is it doesn't even matter if it's in your head or not. If it's manifesting in some sort of a way, what does it matter? It counts, you know? I just, I had to take some time off in order to try and get myself to heal. And now that I'm back, I'm kind of ready just to be just raw and real and talk about how hard it is to have an invisible illness and keep fighting every day. Cause sometimes I'm just, I don't want to fight. Sometimes I don't want to be brave. Sometimes I just want to be a noise at the fact that this is my reality, you know? But then I get back up and I keep fighting again. So I want to help people feel less alone. I want to be a voice for people. The people that have shared their stories, they helped me. So maybe my story will help somebody as well or just add to the voices so that we don't feel so invisible in all of this. It's weird. I want to be invisible because having invisible illness means that you can hide it really well sometimes. But then it's really weird because you also don't want to be invisible. You want people to see how hard you're trying just to be a human being. But I guess all we can do is just share how we're actually feeling. One thing that I've kind of learned having this break is that I need to stop caring so much about being perfect and creating exactly the right thing for the algorithm or for somebody else's idea about how to grow your channel and how to be relevant online. So in some regard, the break has been good for me even though it was really hard to be away from the thing that I love. To finish up, I kind of just want to say thank you to people who've supported me. And I logged into my PayPal and I saw that people have been donating like a dollar or five dollars and a few people have donated more than that. I've blown away. I was like, wait, what is this? It didn't even occur to me that anybody would do anything like that. And I don't know how to even express how thankful I am. You have no idea how much it means to me. I want to get back to doing our Monday chats that we do. And me and Dave, you're like, yeah, let's get back to that because we miss chatting to you guys. I'm just telling you what we're cooking and all this kind of stuff because that's usually what we do. We have our live chat going and we talk about what we made for dinner and what shows we're watching and stuff. So it's been a big part of our lives that's kind of been missing. So we're really excited to kind of get back to that. And I'm really hopeful. And my content might be different and I might be different, but at least I'm doing it. I'm going to just keep trying to do it. Anyone who has a chronic illness or is just dealing with anything that's really difficult at the moment, I'm right there with you. And I know how this feels and it sucks. And it's okay to not want to have to fight every single day and it's okay to feel sorry for yourself. It's okay to be annoyed at cars we've been dealt but just got to keep playing the hands and just see what happens, I guess. Anyway, I am going to go. My sister gave me her laptop to play this in so I'm very happy. Thanks for watching. I appreciate it so much. So thank you. Be kind to yourself. Be kind to others. You're doing the best you can. That's all you can do.