Review: "Invisibly Unwell" by Paige Lavell

Invisibly Unwell by Paige Lavell
Published March 2026 via Life to Paper Publishing
★★★

From the outside, Lavell knew that her life looked cushy: a stable marriage, a stimulating job with wardrobe to match, a house and a mortgage. On the inside, she was barely hanging on—and she knew it was time for a change.

This is framed largely around Lavell's experience with autoimmune disorders, which took her a great deal of time and money and energy to get properly diagnosed and treated. As much as that, though, it's a story about a particular type of perfectionism and a desire to get it "right", even when "right" means doing things that are popular rather than things that work for you specifically. I don't (to the best of my knowledge) have any autoimmune disorders, but I'm not sure how much I'd take away from this if I did, other than solidarity and a reminder that it's important to find doctors who will listen to the full story.

That's not so much a bad thing; part of Lavell's experience involved getting sucked into wellness culture and chasing cures that did not, in fact, cure, and it's much better for her to tell her story in a nonprescriptive way than to assume that the exact things that eventually worked for her will work for others! With that in mind, though, I'd probably look at this more for the story of trying to fit into the wrong size and shape of box before realizing that it's okay to look for something that does fit rather than continuing to try to make yourself fit.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.