Life with Fibromyalgia: Five more things my mother never told me Part 2.
1. Aggravated by with stress
After my daughter was born it was time for me to do my PhD qualifying exam. I preferred childbirth overdoing the PhD qualifying exam. It wasn’t my intelligence that was being tested but my ability to defend my idea and scientific concepts. I needed to defend a project that I did not believe in.
This made it completely difficult and yes I failed that qualifying exam. The months that followed where every PhD student’s nightmare I bounced from lab to lab and the telephone game that preceded me made it difficult for me to join the lab that I really wanted to. In the area where I live your reputation is devised by how someone feels about you. Even if you were not that person. If somebody of authority said ‘it’ about you that was now who you were no mater if you did not have any traits of what was said about you.
It took me a long time to prove myself; I wasn’t what they said I was and in that time it was undoubtedly a stressful situation that made me more tired, irritable, and had more brain fog.
I was even more dysfunctional and it looked like what they were saying about me was really true… I was not fit for PhD studies. This was a very difficult time for me and I almost gave up but then I came home and my very tiny baby was there.
She needed me and she needed me to be strong.
She needed me to wake up one more day and go and make it worth it. Because if I was going to be away from her for the whole day, it had to be worth it.
At that time my stress level skyrocketed through the roof I could feel my body being drained and it was then that I understood the term rolling with the punches. I rolled with every punch and I suffered greatly.
2. Flare-ups are aggravated by some of your favorite foods
Researchers believe that fibromyalgia may be aggravated by certain foods. This is because some foods are inflammatory foods. there may also be an underlying or mild allergy to these foods [1].
In my experience, I have found that I cannot tolerate anything made of soy particularly soy milk and tofu. Whenever I eat these foods, I tend to have a week-long flare up along with dyspepsia and extremely irritable bowels.
Through trial and error I have learned to avoid certain foods or eat it in moderation because I know it won’t be worth it.
3. Your pain NEVER ends
Several years ago I broke my right arm and it has not stopped hurting since. I have gotten two surgeries and did a year-long Physical Therapy program. Fibromyalgia is not like that it cannot be fixed with surgery although some doctors recommend light exercise this does not aid recovery it only eases pain [2].
I remember the first day I woke up almost pain-free after I had started taking my supplements. I thought that I was having an out-of-body experience. After the pain had been significantly reduced I realized how much pain I actually in. I was so happy I cried; I was so sad I cried; I was so relieved I cried.
I now know that I am always in pain that the little aches and pains that I consider normal are not normal and most people don’t feel this kind of pain.
I can manage day-to-day activities anyway and the supplements I take offer support and this reduces the wear and tear on my body and for this reason over the years the pain will not increase … I hope.
4. Post post exertional malaise/fatigue is the devil
I thought that I was just very tired because I wasn’t exercising. I mean, in my twenties I was running 5 plus kilometres everyday. I began to wake up every morning at 5:30 and do some exercise. It really didn’t work out for me because I felt great right after I was done exercising but for the rest of the day my body was so heavy and so exhausted I felt like I was draped in a wet blanket.
The pain in my joints were unreal and I just literally could not move; this continued for about 6 weeks.
I did see my muscles developing and my body becoming more fit, yes, but what was the cost? I was nearly immobile and I could not get through the day without taking several naps. Even if I had napped I didn’t feel that I was rested; I began relying on coffee. I had about four or five cups of coffee per day, even one at night. I need a cup of coffee at 6 p.m. just to take me to 11 p.m.
Now I take D-ribose and whenever I need to do some strenuous activity I just take a little extra to get through the day and I have not had such bad post exertional fatigue since.
5. It seems as if no one cares
During the time of my worst flare-ups I felt like everybody could see that there was something wrong with me. One of the professors at the school even walked up to me and said “It seems as though you have a very heavy weight on your shoulders. And if you keep acting like that people will treat you like that”.
I wanted to tell her that I felt like I was standing tall. I felt like I was smiling and I felt happy.
None of this was translating by the way I looked or acted or was perceived. I feel like there was something else taking over my body.
Some people realized that there was something wrong with me. That’s all they said, “Something’s wrong with you!” “ You need help.” “Why don’t you go get help?” “You’re not fit for a PhD.” The school of thought at that time was, if you’re in a PhD program you should take all the cow-plop that they give to you.
I just felt deep down that they weren’t right.
Maybe you have encountered some of these secrets or may not. Right now you are experiencing an array of emotions, physical pain and a fear that you’ve never felt before. But this is the beginning of a healing journey for you. Each day is a small step; new information and new directions.
Send me a message. I want to know your story. What are five more things you were never told about Fibromyalgia?
- Donaldson, M. S., Speight, N., & Loomis, S. (2001). Fibromyalgia syndrome improved using a mostly raw vegetarian diet: an observational study. BMC complementary and alternative medicine, 1, 7. https://doi.org/10.1186/1472-6882-1-7
- Busch, A. J., Webber, S. C., Brachaniec, M., Bidonde, J., Bello-Haas, V. D., Danyliw, A. D., Overend, T. J., Richards, R. S., Sawant, A., & Schachter, C. L. (2011). Exercise therapy for fibromyalgia. Current pain and headache reports, 15(5), 358–367. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11916-011-0214-2
