The Iconic Flower of Resilience: The Lotus

The lotus flower’s preferred growing environment is thick, wet mud, completely submerged underwater. Buds shoot up over the leaves, reaching heights of five to six feet tall in order to reach the surface and gathering the warmth from the sun. The petals of the lotus flower are hydrophobic, meaning they repel water and dirt, remaining pristine even in the muddy waters from which it roots. For thousands of years many cultures have found deep meaning in the life cycle of the lotus flower. It often represents purity, resiliency, spiritual awakening, and enlightenment (Kelsey Graczyk, National Park Service Blog).

For people with chronic illness, the lotus flower’s struggle to reach the surface resonates on a deep level with their own personal struggles living with a chronic illness. The struggles of navigating the medical system that puts so much emphasis on diagnostics but misses the context and human behind the labs, managing their debilitating symptoms in order to attempt daily functioning, and feeling isolated from people because of their chronic illness. This is made even harder when their chronic illness is invisible. Conditions such as

• Chronic Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS)

• Type 1 Diabetes

• Lupus

• Fibromyalgia

• POTS

• hEDS

• MS

• MCAS