Fibromyalgia is a muscular pain condition that affects up to 5 percent of the U.S. population. It is closely associated with chronic fatigue syndrome, which may often affect the sufferer as well. Muscles all over the body hurt, sometimes severely, and no specific cause is found.
While modern medicine undoubtedly saves lives with its intensive care units and pioneering surgery, it very often lets patients down when they are suffering from chronic pain. If there is no straight forward answer to the patient’s condition or they have failed to respond to the standard treatment, they are often told to go away and live with it, which is easy for the healthcare provider to say but not so easy for the patient.
Symptoms of Fibromyalgia
• Muscle pain all over the body including neck and head pain.
• Stabbing or burning pains in the muscles.
• Chronic exhaustion. Having no energy to do anything. Sometimes the sufferer is bed ridden.
• Problems with staying asleep at night, difficulty concentrating and problems with memory. Some sufferers are unable to work because of all these symptoms.
• Chronic headaches or migraine.
• Abdominal pain, upset stomach, constipation.
• Female sufferers of fibromyalgia may also have painful periods and vulvodynia (chronic pain in the vulva), but not always.
It is common if you suffer from fibromyalgia to also suffer from an additional pain disorder or immune system problem.
Regaining Your Quality of Life
If your doctor has given up on you and tells you to go home, get a second opinion. No person deserves to live in pain. Ask to be referred to a pain clinic. Doctors at a pain clinic specialize in managing patient’s pain.
Pain relieving medication can be given to ease the muscle pain of fibromyalgia, including injections of lidocaine into specific problem areas. Muscle relaxants could also help with pain. Sleeping tablets can be given to induce deep sleep, which is needed to allow the body to repair itself.
The problem with this medical approach is that many fibromyalgia sufferers have chemical sensitivities and some develop the condition after exposure to medications so are reticent about trying more medications.
Other ways of coping with the pain include:
• Warm baths to soothe muscles and promote relaxation
• Get a friend, family member or qualified professional to give you a gentle massage. Vigorous massage can often cause more pain so it’s important that the person massaging you is gentle.
• Heat packs can sometimes help. Some heat packs can be stuck onto your clothing and worn all day long for continuous relief. This is particularly helpful for back and shoulder aches.
• If you suffer from migraines, an herb called feverfew has been shown to ease migraines in some cases and this can be taken in tablet form when you feel a migraine starting. If you are taking other medications for fibromyalgia, please check that they don’t interact with each other before you take feverfew. If the cause of your migraine is dietary or related to high blood pressure, peppermint tea can stop or ease them. Drink two or three cups of peppermint tea as soon as you feel the first symptoms of migraine and it should stop. It’s important to drink it straight away because if you leave it until the symptoms have progressed, it won’t have any effect.
• Buy a full body pillow for your bed, preferably made from memory foam that moulds itself to your body’s shape so that you are more comfortable. V-shaped pillows are also available to support you when you are sitting up.
• Do gentle exercise, as this keeps your muscles supple and makes you produce endorphins, the body’s natural painkiller. Don’t do too much, as this can make it worse.
• Fibromyalgia often goes through bouts of being severe, before it recedes. Often, there are triggers, such as eating a certain food type or being too cold. Knowing what these triggers are and avoiding them can help you avoid severe bouts of the condition.
Reference: Newmann L. Buskila D. Epidemiology of fibromyalgia. Curr Pain Headache Rep 7:362-368, 2003.
Joanna is a freelance health writer for The Mother magazine and Suite 101 with a column on infertility, http://infertility.suite101.com/. She is author of the book, 'Breast Milk: A Natural Immunisation,' and co-author of an educational resource on disabled parenting, in addition to running a charity for people damaged by vaccines or medical mistakes.