This week has been harder than most.

A few days ago, after a hospital appointment, I was told that my autoimmune disease has got worse. I was advised to rest, to slow down and to accept that, for now, my body needs more from me than I would like to admit. I was already struggling with the symptoms, trying to process the news and doing my best to stay optimistic. Then, almost as if my immune system had decided it had reached its limit, I caught the flu as well. Fever, a sore throat, body aches… it felt like everything arrived at once.

I think something in my nervous system simply gave way.

I’ve been feeling far more emotionally fragile than usual, and that’s something I don’t often experience. Normally, I’m a deeply empathetic person. I genuinely care about what other people are going through, and I like being there for them. But over the last few days I noticed something about myself that made me uncomfortable.

I was talking to a few people, and they were telling me about the things that were worrying them. Money. Work. Material things. Everyday frustrations. And for the first time in a long time, my immediate thought was, “Are these really the things we’re worrying about?”

The moment that thought crossed my mind, I felt guilty.

Not because their problems aren’t real. They are. Every person carries burdens that deserve to be heard, and pain isn’t something we should compare. What feels overwhelming to one person may seem small to someone else, but that doesn’t make it any less real.

What I realised, though, is that illness quietly changes the way you see the world.

When your own body becomes the biggest uncertainty in your life, your priorities rearrange themselves without asking your permission. You stop taking your health for granted because you no longer can. Things that once felt urgent begin to fade into the background, replaced by much simpler wishes: to wake up without pain, to have enough energy to leave the house, to eat normally again, to make plans without wondering whether your body will allow you to keep them.

Maybe that’s why I struggled to relate this time. Not because I’ve become less compassionate, but because, at this moment in my life, my perspective has shifted. And if I’m honest, that shift scares me a little. Empathy has always been one of the qualities I value most in myself, so noticing this reaction made me question who I was becoming.

But perhaps it’s not that I’ve become a different person. Perhaps I’m simply exhausted. Physically. Mentally. Emotionally. Sometimes, when your body is fighting every single day, there isn’t much energy left for anything else.

I hope this feeling passes. I hope my health improves, and with it, the part of me that has always been able to hold space for other people’s worries without losing sight of my own. Until then, I’m trying to remind myself of something I often forget: even the people who are usually strong are allowed to have moments when they feel fragile.