Why I Don’t Complain: A Chef’s Guide to Surviving Chronic Illness Without Losing My Mind (or My Manners)

My cardiologist looked at my chart the other day, frowned at the screen, and muttered, “Shit, you’ve been through the ringer.” It wasn’t the first time I’d heard that, but it still landed with the same mix of grim pride and irony. I mean, if there were loyalty points for near-death experiences, I’d have earned the platinum tier by now.

He’s not new to me—we’ve been on this ride for over a decade—but something about seeing it all written out must have hit him differently that day. A leak-prone weakened heart, a busted diaphragm, lungs that occasionally forget how to cooperate,… it reads like the résumé of a crash test dummy. Then he said, “It’s amazing you’re alive. And you never complain.”

And he’s right. I don’t complain. Not because I’m some zen master or beacon of denial—I just think it’s a waste of good oxygen. If there’s a problem, I face it, accept it, analyze it, and get on with fixing it. The time it would take to whine about it, I could’ve already made progress. Plus, as a chef, I save my energy for more important outbursts, like when I burn the garlic.

But I’ll admit, my no-complaints policy sometimes makes me look detached. When people vent endlessly about problems they can fix, I have to resist the urge to hand them a spatula and say, “Stir your own soup.” Maybe that sounds harsh, but when you’ve spent years dragging yourself through heart failure and collapsed lungs, patience for trivial drama sort of evaporates.

Blame my upbringing. I grew up independent—borderline feral, really. At ten, I had a splitting headache, didn’t tell a soul, and biked myself to the doctor. My parents only found out when the nurse called to ask who was footing the bill. That was my childhood in a nutshell: if I didn’t handle it, it didn’t get handled. Somewhere in that mess, I learned that depending on others meant being disappointed.

So I became my own caretaker, nurse, and therapist. If I felt sick, I’d power through it. If I was scared, I’d bury it under a layer of “I’m fine.” And when there’s no one to complain to, you just stop seeing the point. Talking to yourself about how bad things are doesn’t exactly come with a satisfaction guarantee.

Even now, I still think I can take care of everything myself. Old habits die hard. The only person I truly trust to take care of me is my wife—and even then, I sometimes hide how bad I feel because I don’t want to be a burden. I convince myself I’m “protecting” her, but really, it’s another flavor of distrust. It’s me saying, “I don’t believe you can handle seeing me at my worst.”

That realization hit recently, and it stopped me cold. I’ve spent my life being proud of my independence, but maybe strength isn’t always about holding everything in—it’s also about letting someone else in. These days, when I’m not feeling well, I try to tell her. And ten times out of ten, she knows exactly what to do. She doesn’t need to cook or fetch or fix—she just rests her hand on my forehead, and somehow I go from basement to penthouse in seconds. Her hands are healing without even trying.

Still, I don’t complain. I mention. I’ll say, “Hey, today’s one of those ‘walking through cement’ days,” and that’s enough. I don’t need sympathy; I just need acknowledgment. What I can’t stand—still—are the chronic complainers of the world. The ones who moan about things they can fix but don’t. The ones who treat misery like a sport. My tolerance for that kind of noise is about as low as my lung capacity on a bad day.

So no, I don’t complain. I adapt. Because life already threw the book at me, and instead of crying about it, I decided to read it, annotate the margins, and probably turn it into a blog post. Complaining never healed anyone—but acceptance, humor, and a dash of stubbornness? That’s a recipe worth keeping.

If you’ve ever found yourself muttering “why me?” instead of “what now?”, maybe it’s time to flip the script. I’d love to hear how you handle life’s curveballs—drop a comment or subscribe so we can trade notes on surviving the ridiculousness together.