THE FIBROMYALGIA SERIES PART F

The Fibro series.

And, golly gee....

we're going to start with the letter "F."

Guess what that stands for??

Frick??

F is for Fibromyalgia that wants to suck the life out of you. It takes a vibrant, thriving person and turns them into something that is unrecognizable. I look in the mirror with wonder and say, "what the hell happened to me?" 

F is for the fog that turns a fairly intelligent person into a lump of jelly. There are times that I actually think an amoeba has a higher IQ than I do.  The fog has me looking for glasses and they're on top of my head. It's scrambling for the keys that are right in my hand. It has me standing in the middle of the grocery store wondering what I was supposed to buy.

F is for the fatigue that isn't relieved by sleep. It's the feeling that roadkill feels better than you do. It's going out to do simple errands and coming home feeling defeated because you haven't expended hardly any energy. 

F is for the fun that we miss. It seems that making plans is a thing of the past. If we do make plans there is always that caveat that "it depends on how the day progresses."  Sometimes I feel like I sit in the shadows because I don't want the focus to be on me. I used to have a lot of fun. Now, I don't.

F is for fat. I don't get as much hard exercise anymore so it's harder to lose weight. Even though I'm not, I feel like a big fat lump. 

F is for frustration. Everything about this illness frustrates me. Every single time I get dismissed by another doctor I get frustrated. When I get the look that tells me the word Fibromyalgia is a garbage can diagnosis, I get frustrated. I get frustrated when I can't think straight and I get frustrated when I don't feel good for days on end. 

F  is for force. There are the days that I finally say "screw it" and force myself to either work out or push myself beyond what my body decides I'm able to do. I do this periodically when I get tired of being tired.

F is for the fetal position that I find myself in after I get finished doing the above. 

F is for fearful. Every time a new symptom rears its ugly head I become fearful. I'm afraid of my own body because I can't trust it anymore.

F is for facade. I do this well because I don't want people to know how bad the pain is or not to appear weak. I hide behind this smiling facade and only those who know me well can see beyond it.

F is for faith. I have faith that it will all work out. It took awhile to get here. I've suffered through the confusion about my path and through the loss of my identity and income. Faith has brought me through so many things in my life and it has never failed me. I just have to search to find it and bring it front and center.

F is for forgiveness. I think that we need to forgive ourselves for being sick. We are so used to having control over our bodies and our lives that it's tough to navigate this thing called chronic illness.

F is for flares. Nuff said.

F can be for so many things,

feeling frail,

feeling feeble

feeling frightened

feeling forgetful

feeling fearful

feeling those fears are frivolous

feeling that finally life will never go forward.

But then,

F can ultimately stand for freedom because we can be free of fear.

F can also stand for fibromyalgia allowing us,in spite of everything, to fly and find ourselves.

What other F-words do you know??

THE OPTIPESS ANOMALY

Optimist? Nope.

Pessimist, shmesimist.

It all looks the same to me.

And I'm positive it will all work out.

I guess that makes me....

an optipess.

I'm not being pessimistic, I'm thinking in a positive manner.  I'm positive that this flare is winning. I really want to feel better but my thoughts are not cooperating. 

I know that thought can do so much for your outlook and help distract you from the pain that threatens to take over every fiber of your being. There's so much that attitude can help and when chronic pain is a part of your life, you definitely need to keep your attitude in check.

I know this but I'm having a hard time doing it.

As I research right brain and left brain function, I see a startling fact. First, meditation does grow the gray matter in your brain. I'm not saying you have to sit cross legged and say ohm but some sort of quiet time focusing on nothing but relaxing your body and getting your brain waves down to something lower than an beta level would be highly beneficial. Second, thinking does affect your body and it will go in the direction of your thoughts. 

Remember, the power of positive thinking?

The beta level is most associated with our normal waking state. Beta helps with analysis, logical thinking and active attentive function. Stress can throw the beta level into overdrive. I think that I'm very familiar with the beta level in overdrive.

Negative thinking brings cortisol and other lovely things that are only intended for the flight or fight syndrome. That syndrome is there to keep us alive. It's not there to be used on a continual basis or as a way to live. That impacts your body in a very unhealthy way.

Negativity also obscures your thinking and stands between you and your realization. I heard this today and pondered on this for awhile. While I have talked myself into many, many things; self realization and having the ability to move beyond my fears isn't one of them. It would be interesting to find out how much I could really do if I didn't talk myself out of things due to fear or my inherently cynical way of thinking.

So, how do you take a natural cynic and turn that around into a positive force? I haven't figured that one out yet. I've got a litany of quotes regarding human nature.......

No good deed goes unpunished.

When you see the light at the end of the tunnel it's probably the train coming at full speed.

It's always darkest before it goes pitch black.

In the battle between you and the world.....bet on the world.

Yep,

just call me Little Mary Sunshine.........

Does this tell you anything about how I feel right now??

Very optipesstic.

THE BLOODSUCKING LEECH EXTRACTION

Little Sucker Word of the Day

leech

"You would probably be alarmed if your doctor kept a container of bloodsucking worms on her desk, but it wasn't always so. It may be shocking to learn that today's word, before it denoted said bloodsucking worm, meant "physician" or "surgeon." The creature attracted the name because of the former use of leeches by physicians to bleed patients. Leech is a native English word, of ancient origin."

I get Thinkmaps Visual Thesaurus Word of the Day in my email. I'm one of those geeks that love words. I will say that since Fibromyalgia has been foraging around my system my mind works slower than it used to and my vocabulary has definitely shrunk. (Hey, I sounded kind of literate there for a moment!)

Not so fast.

Anyway, when I saw this word I knew I'd have to comment. 

Where to begin? The fact that while there are some excellent physicians who really take the time and have the desire to help you, there are those that resemble the picture and word that I'm writing about. You know those doctors. The ones that take thousands from you promising to cure what ails you only to tell you that it will take thousands more, "but you're on the right track."

Or those who belittle and dismiss your symptoms as, "all in your head." The ones that tell you Fibromyalgia isn't real and they certainly won't write that down in your chart.  The ones that have you crying when you leave the office. They are also the physicians that have you doubting yourself and you start thinking about what you did to deserve this or, worse, what you did to yourself that brought this on. 

But then I thought of something else.

There's also this blood sucking leech called Fibromyalgia. It wants to suck every bit of life and joy out of you. There are leeches of this illness all over our bodies and our soul and every time we recognize one of them we need to pluck them off and throw them in the fire. The leech of telling us life is over and we will be miserable for the rest of our lives. That one? Definitely pluck that off and throw it!

Whenever anything robs you of your joy, whether it be a symptom or a doctor, get rid of it.

We have enough to deal with managing our symptoms.

We can't let all this other crap get in the way of that.

I know that laughter is truly the best medicine,

even though sometimes I feel like I'm in the placebo group.

The link:  Thinkmap Visual Thesaurus