I'm not sure how this is going to pan out....I'm going to write it and leave it at that, lol. The reason is that this is my life struggle now. Being only 26 and feeling like I'm in my 80s! I have Fibromyalgia, a very unknown, missunderstood and very
painful condition. Fibro, as I will call it, it a condition that effects the muscular-skeletal system. Meaning all your muscles, tendons, ligaments, cartilige, joints and bones. It can effect a specific part of your body or all of it, or areas here and there, and different areas at a time. Make sense? I hope so, anyway, it causes pain and inflamation mainly in your main joints like the hip, knees, elbows and wrist. Though it can hit any body part, and many times there is no actually inflamation, just pain. More women are affected by this then men, why don't know, maybe hormones...
To actually be diagnosed with Fibro, one must be tested for pretty much everything else and then have them ruled out. There is no actual test, unlike say lupus, where you can test the blood and there are abnormalities with the Sed rate (shows inflamation in the body), white blood count (used for infection) as well your RA factor (for both lupus, and Rheumatoid Arthritis) and a few other blood tests. There is one test that the doctor will do, and depending on the outcome can give a diagnosis...in most instances. This test where they touch about 18 points on your body and if you exprience pain on 11 or more, then it's diagnosed Fibro. But that is after all other things have been rulled out. Fibro, they look at it, is more a what I don't have diagnosis, not a what I do have. And many times it can be confused with CFS, chronic fatigue syndrome, where you feel tired all the time. But that is another article. What's sad is that many doctors don't believe that this is a real disease and it can go on for years before you can actually be diagnosed with it, which means years of unnecessary pain, and mental anguish. Only a Rhuemetologist can give you a good diagnosis, as this falls into their specialty.
So here is my story:
I was 19, it was the begining of the year and I had not been feeling well for awhile. I was working and I told my boss that I just was not feeling well. I felt weak and faint. He was good friend and new that something was wrong. He asked if I wanted to go to the hospital since I could not lift my head, nor walk. He had to get someone to take me to the hospital. Once I got there I was just out of it. I was so tired and in alot of pain. The E.R. doctor came in and did an assesment on me, checking how far I could lift my legs, where it hurt, all that good stuff. They drew a bunch of blood and sent me to get and MRI, and a CT. They admitted my to the hospital as I was showing signs of system failure. They had me on meds and had a rheumatologist come in and examine me. They gave me pain medicine and I had a catheter as I could not get up. After about 2 days I think, they told me what I had. They said that my body just shut down and I developed the Fibro. After being in the hospital for about a week, I was able to go home. I has physical therepy in the hospital and I remember getting those painful heprin shots in my stomach! I was so miserable...They had a phycologist come in to see if I was depressed...Of course I was not, but it was down because of going thru this.
Upon coming home I had many obsticals ahead of me. One of the things that I now have to live with is the painful arthritic feeling in my knees, feet and back....I had a long road to get my strenght back, I had to take several months of from work to get better. I was very shaky when I first got home, I could not walk much and out of no where I would feel very weak and I would have to hold onto things to keep from falling, and just to walk. I was taking several different medications for pain and my muscles....I developed plurasy(spelling) many times. It's an infection of the the plueral linning around the heart and lungs, which can be deadly. I would have horrible inflamation in my ribs (the cartalige in between the bones) and in my spin. I would get a bad burning sensation in my spin and on my chest. This went on for several years. I was also ANA+, which means that my body produces antibodies to attack my body... For this I had alot of pain in my knees. I had to visit my doctor about once a month for a long time, then every time I would have a "flare up". See with this condition, there are periods of time where you can be as healthy as a horse, and not have any pain, then in a blink of an eye, you can be doubled over with pain, called a flare up. I would get these that would last for at least 2 weeks, inwhich I had to take very powerful medicine, other wise my body would start to shut down again. I was always in pain though, always my spine, though some days better then others. I would have to take steroids as well to get the inflammation under control. And when I was on all this I would not eat, and I lost alot of weight....not good, nor is it fun being high..which is how I feel on the meds.
Well, fast foward now to today and I'm still living with it. Though, thanks to God, I don't have the everday symptoms as I did before. I still get the burning in my back, and when anyone touches it, it sets it off. I wake every morning with pain in my feet to the point I cant stand on them without feeling like I'm going to fall. I constantly feel like I have the flu, and when I dont' get sleep, it's all alot worse. The hardest part is when you are pregnant as this put alot of stress on your body. And mine cant' handle it. I got so ill both time for the first 5 months with pain and flu like symptoms...but because of the baby making a cortosteroid in the second half of pregnancy, it naturally makes it better. So the pain went away, but then after having the baby, makes it even worse. More then while I'm pregnant as my body has just undergone the most stress it can ever endure, and bam, I can't get out of bed! It's so hard too since I don't want my babies to see me cry. Sometimes the pain is so much, all over, that I all I want to do is stay in bed and sleep. My hubby is really good supporting me. He has seen me cry from it, and knows when I say I don't feel well, and he hears it in my voice, he is very caring. This is why I don't work anymore, that and a complication after having my baby girl...but again, that's another article too...lol.
ok, enough babbling..The thing I want to pass on is this:
If you or someone you know has these symptoms, make sure you get them checked out, keep pushing. There are several other conditions that Fibro can mimic, including lupus, lyme disease, CFS, the flu, RA, and other arthritic conditions. Oh and this is not known either, but many people who do have Fibro often are later diagnosed with lupus. Because they seem to go hand in hand, and outside of slight blood test results are identical. Thought Fibro can't kill you, though it feels like it is, lupus can, this from complications of lupus....ie in the liver mainly. So where was I? Oh yeah, there is no cure, but they think the stem cell therepy can cure it...but they are not to that stage yet. They can only treat the symptoms at the moment....
If there are any questions you have, let me know and I will answer them in here. I'm sure I missed something, as this is a very unknown disease...And to anyone who reads this that has this, it can get better, and your not alone.
