Young Writers Society

I'm trying to find a disease for a main character in a book I am thinking of writing.
The only thing is, most diseases that I have found so far either affect the person mentally or isn't life-shortening.
I was actually thinking of Cystic Fibrosis, since I knew someone who died of that at age 19.

I would like to find one that makes a person look like she is perfectly fine, but is actually dying.

Thanks so much! *throws chocolate*

Cancer would be your best bet. There are so many conditions related to it, that you'll have freedom to choose. Cancer can also move very quickly infecting organs or it grows slowly over the course of time.

Plus, people generally look normal.

Yea, I was about to say...Cancer will do that. Or a brain tumor or something of the sort.

For younger people the most common form of cancer if Acute Lymphocitic Leukemia (ALL), if you are going for cancer...that's your most believable bet.

ALL is a good bet - the symptoms are very minor and you only become ill when you start chemo.

If you do choose to write about ALL, then feel free to pm me for help. I had ALL when I was younger so I can help with some background knowledge.

All the best,
Alainna
xx

When is the story set? My sister has Cystic Fibrosis, and because it's so rare, there are a lot of misconceptions about it... a lot of people still think CF patients don't live past around 13, but advancements have been made and I think the average life expectancy is around 30 now (You'll want to double check that). I'm sorry the person you knew was not so fortunate.

It's true that CF doesn't have any visible symptoms, but the heavy coughing can be a give away. My sister doesn't have to make super drastic life changes to fight CF, just frequent check-ups, some daily asthma-type breathing treatments, and enzyme pills before she eats certain foods... That's just my experience, though.

Hope that helped a bit. ^_^

Try having a more well-known disease, so it helps your readers relate to the story rather than having to look up what it means. It might also save you the trouble of describing the medicine behind the disorder.

Edit: Consider Leukaemia? Not many apparent affects but the person dies young.. even with regular treatment.
Hypertension? Possible at a young age and kills you slowly with not many obvious sign/symptoms.