Who are these people you ask?
The silent suffers are the people who live with everyday illnesses, that have similar symptoms to Covid.
They suffer not from having had Covid but from an illness that has been around for years and there is no way around it but to managing it. I am one of these people. I suffer with asthma manly in winter but is back under control by summer.
The past three years have been different as you needed to find different ways to manage it. This can be fine but there is still a need to cough to help with breathing. The stares that are being given when the coughing starts ends up being mentally draining more than needing to cough to help with breathing, wearing a mask is of little help as well because it can set of a coughing fit as well. Not wearing a mask is almost like needing to cough, instead of just the stares there are also people talking under their breath who do wear a mask about how it is against regulations because there is someone not wearing a mask. Even though they can see that this person is probably having trouble breathing because of what they have done for the day and that is the reason as to why they are not wearing a mask but still obeying the regulations that are in place.
The mental toll from all of this can be high for the silent suffers as they do not complain they just hide it and go about their day till they get home. There are questions that go through your head when this happens for most of these people. One being “Why do I have to live with this illness at this time?” Another being “Can we be considerate of the people around us as we don’t know what they are living with so it may not be healthy for them to wear a mask?”
Even when needing to cough there are questions that can go through your head of “Can’t you see that I am healthy, it may not even be Covid?” Even just telling people after you have coughed, they have given you a stare that “No I do not have Covid it is just my asthma being annoying” is hard. Even all of this can take a mental toll, as for three years people with an illness that is not Covid have had to live with but is something that have been living with for most of their life or were living with it just before Covid had started in 2020.
Belinda's art 