how people with chronic illness use social media to sooth their pain

#LongRead — How People With Chronic Illness Use Social Media To Soothe Their Pain

This week in our long reads* section, we are featuring and article that we found both inspiring and humbling, about how patients with chronic illness use social media to soothe their pain.

While many people now try to cure their addiction to social media, some patient actually leverage social media as a cure to relieve their suffering:

When patients are asked to rate their pain on a scale from zero to 10, they may report higher levels of pain in an attempt to communicate their “helplessness and hopelessness.” The problem is not that it hurts more; it’s that it just never stops hurting. For some patients, Instagram and Tumblr are better places to express that feeling than the doctor’s office.

In this fascinating Slate article titled The Social Media Cure, by Reporter Amanda Hess, you will learn:

  • What pain networks are.
  • How people who may not “look” sick can share their pain — not to complain, but to explain — through social media.
  • Which specific codes, hashtags and memes the “spoonies” have developed.

A must-read, most definitely.


*About Loomly Toolkit Long Reads: every other week, we select a third-party, long-form article addressing a major topic related to social media and bring it to you. In a nutshell, our team curates smart content, so you don’t have to.


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