My name is Jodie Rafferty. I’m 43, a mum of four, the founder of Rafferty Resourcing, owner of four extremely demanding dachshunds, and, for the first time really, I’m talking openly about something I’ve spent years making sure nobody knew.

I live with chronic illness.

Even writing that feels strange, because I’ve never wanted illness to become part of how people describe me.

Around 13 years ago, following a serious car accident, I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia. I also have problems with my spine and mobility, cluster headaches and various deficiencies. Some days I manage everything relatively well. Other days I physically struggle to get out of bed. There are times I need crutches, times I’m heavily medicated and plenty of times when my laptop comes to bed with me because that’s where I need to work from. I also rely on oxygen quite regularly to manage my cluster headaches. It’s just another part of life that happens quietly in the background, something I deal with when I need to, and then carry on.

And yet, for the most part, nobody would ever know.

For 13 years, I’ve run Rafferty Resourcing, recruiting across the UK and Europe within head office and audio-visual recruitment. I get up, do my hair, put my makeup on, turn up and get on with it. I’ve become very good at masking the difficult days, adapting quietly and making sure that whatever is happening behind the scenes never becomes somebody else’s problem.

I’ve also become very good at not talking about it.

I think, if I’m completely truthful, there has always been a little bit of fear attached to that. If clients knew I was unwell, would they worry that I couldn’t deliver? Would people see me differently? Would they question whether I could cope?

So I kept it private.

Meanwhile, the business continued to grow. We’ve won multiple awards for our service and three awards for candidate experience. In 2023, I recieved an Influential Businesswoman of the Year  award and Permanent Recruiter of the Year by the Recruitment & Employment Confederation.

What nobody saw alongside those achievements were the hospital appointments, the days working from bed, the crutches, the medication, the oxygen or the careful management that sometimes went into making an ordinary working day possible.

I even had my appendix removed and apparently came round from the anaesthetic negotiating with a candidate. I have absolutely no recollection of this, which is probably just as well!

But there’s another reason I have the outlook I do.

Two of my children live with serious chronic illnesses. One of my sons has severe chronic fatigue syndrome and is among those most profoundly affected by the condition, while another of my children has lupus. As a family, illness is something we have had to learn to accommodate, but we have never wanted it to become the thing that defines what our lives can look like.

My husband and I run two successful businesses. We have four children, four dogs, a busy home and all the chaos that comes with it. We work, we laugh, we make plans, we have difficult days and we keep going.

Running my own business has been hugely important to me because it gives me the flexibility to manage my health and care for my family. I can structure my working life around what my body allows me to do. I already build time off into my week. I work from bed when I need to. I have support around me. I’ve learned when to push and when I need to adapt.

Could I work a conventional full-time job in the same way? Probably not. But that doesn’t mean I can’t work, build something successful or have ambition. I just have to do it differently.

And perhaps that’s why I’ve decided to talk about it now.

People often ask me, “How do you do it?” Until now, I’ve never really given them the full answer.

The answer is that sometimes it’s really hard.

There are mornings when getting out of bed is an achievement before the working day has even begun. Sometimes my condition wins and plans have to change. I can have all the determination in the world, but I also have chronic illnesses, and mindset doesn’t magically make those disappear.

What mindset does change is how I respond to them.

I’ve learned to manage my life around the reality of my health rather than waiting for the day when everything suddenly becomes easier. I adapt. I put support in place. I make adjustments. And then, when I can, I get on with the things that matter to me.

For years, I thought keeping all of this hidden was a strength. Now I wonder whether being open about it might be more useful. Not because I want sympathy. I really don't.

But because there may be somebody else quietly managing an illness, a disability, caring responsibilities or circumstances that nobody around them knows about, wondering whether they can still have the career, business or life they imagined.

I certainly don’t have all the answers, and there are days when I don’t get it right either. But I do know that my health is part of my life. It isn't the sum total of it.

I’m still Jodie. I’m still running my business. I’m still raising my family. I’m still ambitious. I’m still turning up.

I’m just finally being a little more honest about what turning up sometimes takes.