Living With Fibromyalgia: Part 3. It’s okay to mourn.

It’s okay to mourn the health and abilities you used to have that now seem like a lifetime ago. 

You see, I took a long time to accept my diagnosis. Test after test, appointment after appointment, medication after medication, the results were there. Fibromyalgia. 

That’s really all the doctors had to say. No advice on how to manage other than take this medication, no warnings on how life will change, no explanation of the diagnosis and the future. Just “you have fibromyalgia. We can treat the symptoms, but it’ll never go away. We’ve called in a prescription for you. We will start there and see how you do.”

Shocked, I left, got in the truck, and called my husband as I drove to the pharmacy. 

But I still had good days. Days of energy and no pain. Maybe I was fine after all and it was a fluke. I’m healthy. I don’t need the medicine. 

It was months before I actually said the words, “I have fibromyalgia,” and when I did, it felt so foreign, almost made up. My husband actually said it first and I was just surprised at the sound, at the reality.

Then it would hit me. Pain, fatigue, brain fog, appetite changes. Bad days. This wasn’t my mind playing tricks on me. This was fibromyalgia. 

The symptoms get worse as my cycle approaches. This lasts for days. This is a fibro flare. Not only will stress affect your fibro, but hormones will, too. 

This is new.

Showering is exhausting. 

I can’t fold two baskets of laundry back to back most days. 

I can’t work out the same way I used to. 

I am in some amount of pain every single day. 

I am cold all the time. 

If I get too cold, I begin to hurt. 

Significant weather changes cause me pain. 

Migraines. Oh, the migraines. 

More medicine. More temporary fixes. 

Joint pain that is definitely not arthritis, and medicine doesn’t help. 

No cause or solution for the pain. My body just hurts. 

Sleeping 10 hours and being exhausted. 

When I have a good day, I have energy, and minimal pain, so I do all the things that I haven’t been able to accomplish in the last week. It was too much. It takes 3 days to recover and get my energy back from that. 

My hands hurt all the time. 

I can’t color with my kids anymore. 

I can’t use skinny pens anymore. 

I can’t type much at one time anymore. 

Some days doing my makeup is enough to significantly hurt my hands. 

I’ve had to ask my husband to cut my food for me…in a restaurant. That was fun.

I can’t find the words to make a sentence. 

I can look at an object but can’t recall the name. 

It’s like my brain stops working. 

These changes and symptoms do not always make sense. You don’t always know when they will come or go or how bad they’ll be. 

That’s okay.

Do your best each day. Even if that means resting. 

Let others help when you need it. 

Your fibro does not define you. 

Take a nap, take a hot bath, don’t clean the whole house today, it’s okay. 

Be thankful for the health you do have. The things you can do. 

Do not let your diagnosis steal your joy. 

Every day is a blessing and you get to choose to be thankful. 

Psalm 118:24, “This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.”

Psalm 68:19, “Blessed be the Lord, who daily loadeth us with benefits, even the God of our salvation. Selah.”

1 Thessalonians 5:18, “In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.” 

Choose gratitude.

Stay in the Word, stay close to the Shepherd, and let Him lead you in paths of righteousness. 

With Hope in His Service,

Heather