For a long time, talking about illness has been more than a little taboo. We don’t like thinking about it, or talking about it and we definitely would never ‘glamourise’ it.

But one woman has done just that and now the internet is rife with people following her lead. Karolyn Gehrig is an artist suffering from Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS), an inherited disorder that affects the body’s connective tissues and forces her to be in hospital – a lot.

Sick of seeming invisible, Gehrig decided to post glamorous photos of herself using the hashtag #HospitalGlam to stop her feeling so invisible.

“I started posting #hospitalglam because it was frustrating to me that every time I got sicker I’d disappear from my commitments and then feel shy about explaining where I’d been when I knew there was absolutely nothing wrong with pursuing treatment for my disabling chronic illnesses,” Gehrig told The Huffington Post.

Gehrig says the photos of day-to-day life as a patient has helped her to cope with her illness.

“I began using some conventions of fashion photography to strip away ambiguity about my viewpoint and make it clear that I retain every part of myself through this battle,” Gehrig said. “I’m very excited to see how we can move forward and work on destigmatising illness en masse.”

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