I once watched an episode of House M.D. where a man came to the clinic and outlined his symptoms. Familiar symptoms. My symptoms. Having just been diagnosed with one of the most misrepresented illnesses of our time, I perked up. Was House about to diagnose my condition? How would this be handled on prime time?
House, genius diagnostician that he was, recognised the symptoms immediately. His patient had recited the diagnostic criteria for chronic fatigue syndrome. House gave the man a long-suffering eyebrow, filled a pill bottle with candy, and presented it as a cure. Hilarious!
I cried that night. The disabling illness that had taken my career, my independence and my social life had just been trivialised to viewers the world over, and the worst of it was, I knew there would be no outcry. Too few people knew enough to care.
In the age of identity politics, the importance of representing minorities on screen is at least acknowledged, if not fully realised. People with disabilities are starting to see a few more well-rounded protagonists on screen, if not the disabled actors we’d like. Stereotypes are still prevalent, but they are being challenged. There’s been progress, but there’s a long way to go.
" the invisibly chronic ill are not represented in popular culture"
However, though I’ve been listening and contributing to conversations about disability media inclusion for many years now, it took me a surprisingly long time to realise that my own demographic, the invisibly chronic ill, are not represented in popular culture. Apart from the occasional Housesque mockery, there’s nothing. No protagonists, no supporting characters, just … nothing. No reference to rally around. No hero to act as a role model.
Considering the ongoing popularity of medical dramas, with hundreds upon thousands of episodes devoted to illness and injury, this erasure is shocking. How did this happen? And, apart from giving writers free reign to deride with impunity, what is the impact?
After decades of medical procedurals continuously centralising the experiences of doctors, we are culturally conditioned to relate to medical staff, view illness as an antagonist, and codify patients - or their wellbeing - as an objective.
"Illness is something you fight, hard and fast, and either recover from or die."
Grey’s Anatomy takes this objectification one step further by routinely reducing illness experiences to direct metaphors for the dramas of the perfectly healthy main cast. A patient is having disruptive spontaneous orgasms? What a great opportunity for the residents to learn you can have too much of a good thing.
The story never lingers with the ill - patients are moved through the narrative like products on a conveyor belt. Illness is something you fight, hard and fast, and either recover from or die. The battle is definitively won or lost within forty-two minutes of high drama, and then everyone moves on. Ongoing illness never becomes part of the cultural lexicon.
People trying to cope with the long term reality of being stuck in bed, nausea that never fully abates and dependence on family for basic needs, can find themselves at sea without a familiar narrative to act as a rudder.
Decades of Scrubs and E.R. and Private Practice and All Saints have kept us stuck on the idea that people can John Wayne their way through any medical condition. Patients are expected to gain intel on the enemy (illness) and develop battle plans. If plan A doesn’t work, move on to plan B, and C, and D (nothing ever works the first time on television) until you are either healed or flatlining.
It doesn’t seem to matter if anyone has actually developed effective treatments for your condition - friends, family and even health authorities expect you to keep experimenting with everything from pseudo-science to snake oil (an approach that can hurt your wallet more than it serves your health). Anything less is giving up, admitting defeat, a state associated with depression and hopelessness and lack of moral fiber.
I disagree. In my experience, the pressure to “keep fighting” only impedes a healthy grieving process. You can’t accept and adapt to your situation if you are at war with it. You remain in a holding pattern, waiting for your life to resume, rather than living it. To quote John Lennon, “Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans.”
" You can’t accept and adapt to your situation if you are at war with it. "
Unfortunately, this disconnect between television and reality can create conflict. Conflict within the self as you let go of your cultural conditioning, and conflict with those around you, who may not be prepared to deal with a chronically ill person who simply “refuses” to recover. There are those who grow angry or offended, and an alarming tendency in some to withhold support as a motivator.
They do this because they’ve been fed the narrative that illness is supposed to be short lived. When someone dares to accept their chronic illness, it forces people to face the transient nature of their own health. The comforting illusion of control becomes difficult to maintain. But, unfortunately, eating right and exercising and meditating and taking your vitamins doesn’t make anyone impervious to chronic illness. This could happen to you tomorrow.
Perhaps we’d all cope better if our popular culture reflected and normalised that.
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