New here

Hi Dee and welcome to the forum. Sounds like you are having a tough time right now, im sorry to hear that and I hope you get to feeling better soon!
I am also a stay at home mother, I have 3 boys. My oldest is in school but my youngest two are home with me all day. I have to say that your post reminded me a lot about myself. I was also just diagnosed recently (dont ask me to remember when lol) but I believe I have had it for at least 10 years and getting progressively worse. I often times feel guilty as well, you are not alone there. I feel bad when my husband comes home from working all day, and I have to ask him for help when I have hardly even accomplished any chores all day. I just have to do things at my own pace as slow as that is...When I feel guilty about it or start feeling the self hate, I remind myself that its not my fault and I cant change how I feel. I just have to learn to accept it, I am still in the process but it is getting easier. My mother also kept a very clean house and compared to that I am seriously lacking. But you know what? I do the best I can and that just has to be good enough.

As far as the PMS symptoms go, for at least the last 8 months mine have been worse. Ive always been irregular and that hasnt changed but now I have 2 weeks of agony when I get mine. Migraines, really bad cramps (they are like labor pains), and just overall being very sick.

I am still waiting to see my doctor about this. I had a physical booked, waited 2 months for it only to have my ins canceled just before the day. Now I have to wait again until the ins is back up and try to be seen as soon as possible.

I think that many of us with fibro have these problems with pms unfortunately. Does being on the pill help or make it worse? I am considering going on the pill myself to see if it will help with the pms, one of the things I wanted to see the doctor about.

Anyways I have babbled enough lol but I wanted to let you know you are not alone! You are not a whining, lazy low life! You have fibromyalgia and you are sick and its not your fault! *hugs* take care and welcome

DMax, it sounds like you have a type A personality. Most fibromites do. I am much as you describe. I will do it regardless of cost. Then I apy dearly and can't do anything for 1-2 weeks. I also have pms, but I think mine is from Crohn's.

welcome! Good group here.

Hi, Dee, and welcome to the fibromyalgia forum!  I'm so glad you joined us.  You have found out what happens if you don't pace yourself.  You cannot clean for hours and not expect those muscles to scream at you.  You have to do a little at a time.  My Mom was spotless, too, and I used to be...but not anymore.  I have a sign in my kitchen that says, "If you've come to see me, Welcome!  If you've come to see my home, Make an appointment!"    I will mop the floor one day, vacuum and dust another day, etc.  I work for a little bit and then take a break.  Then I go back to it.  I earmark mornings to get my goals done.  I've got the most energy in the mornings.  Today I had my hair cut, took my dog to the groomer, ran to two grocery stores, picked up my dog and was back home around noon.  I unloaded the dishwasher and froze some leftovers.  Now, I'm done for the day.  It is 1:30 in the afternoon.  I will relax, read, etc. until it is time for dinner.  This is how a typical day for me goes and my body can handle this without my being miserable. 

As you learn to live with fibro, you will also learn what you can and cannot do.  You will learn to control the pain.  I use ibuprofen (with food) and Tylenol for pain and I started taking malic acid/magnesium supplements last winter and they have really helped me with pain and fatigue.  I'll bump up the thread all about them.  There are links on that thread that explain how it works in the body and also a double blind study that has been done with malic acid/magnesium.

Also, check out the Fibro 101 thread...the second thread at the top of the forum.  There is a lot of good info in there about fibromyalgia.  Don't hesitate to ask questions.  We are here to help you.  I hope to hear more from you soon!

Sherrine 

Hi DMax and welcome to the forum.  Unlike most of you guys I didnt have a mom with a spotless house.  My mother,I believe suffered from clinical depression most of her life so about the time I turned 11 I took on the role of mother to my brothers and to my own mom much of the time.  I was the one that spent late hours on my hands and knee's getting our white tiled floors sparkling and every shelf lemon pledge shiney.  It has always been my "job" to make all the holidays and birthdays just right and now that I am the grandma to four with 2 of those being special needs kids I have always been the go to person if anyone needed or wanted anything.  I went on disability 8 years ago after falling down a flight of stairs and breaking my back and hurting pretty much everything else on the way down and also have a history of many surgeries so chronic pain is no stranger to me.  But I was always able to hold it together until about a year ago when all the sudden I wasnt snapping back like I used to and I was so tired all the time with this deep down muscle aching that took all I had sometimes to just climb the stairs at the end of the day.

 

I was dx'd with fibro about 6 months ago but it turns out my doctor thought I had it for some time before then(would have been nice if he let me in on it).  I still tried to be superwoman to all my family and even though they knew I was having a hard time of it they still took the help.  As my daughter put it"who else is there?".  After finding this place I finally grew a backbone and am learning to say no.  I always felt like if I wasnt the one that did it all for everyone then what good was I to anyone?  I failed to realize that even on days when I cant do so much I am still a good person and ppl would still love me just the same.  It has takin some doing with my family to get the point across that I am no longer their chore girl anymore,that when I say I am done for the day that means not to ask just that one more favor from me.  I had made them dependent on me by not having them do for themselves.  I still have guilt when I feel like I can't finish all I wanted to do for the day.  Last night was one of them.  I had already done 2 loads of dish washing(no dish washer here other then myself most of the time) and there were a few left over and I told my husband that I would do them in the morning.  But the more I thought about it and looked into the kitchen the more it bugged me lol so there I was at 9pm washing the dishes and setting up the coffee pot for this morning.  Some habits are hard to break.  You do, I think have to almost go through a grieving period for your old life and learn to accept your limitations.  I am getting better about pacing myself.  Ppl on here still think I am overdoing it but they have to understand for me this is slowing down and sometimes it is worth it for me to have some extra pain for a few days to not let some moments pass me by.

 

Remember first most that you are a good person and a good mother and just because you dont do things the way you used to doesnt change that fact.  Your family will survive and so will you and you can still have a good life even with fibro.  Take care.

 

Soft Hugs,

Karen

Hi Dee, I was a stay at home mom with a one-year old when I got fibro. But it was diagnosed as lupus and 25 years ago that was close to a death sentence. In some ways, I think it was good to have the lupus rx because I really started to do the important things. I have two sons, grown now, and when they were little I made sure I used my small amount of energy for them, not housework, yardwork, bill-paying or anything else. I am so glad I spent my time with my children, now I still can't do any work, but at least my children don't need me so much now. Diane

Hi Dee & welcome,

I myself am a newbie to this site, but it's not an exaggeration when people here say that they're family and that they care about each other. There's a lot more genuine caring here than I've seen in any other online place.

Learning to accept the limitations is hard. Like you, I was always the caretaker. I was always the one that took care of my aging grandmother, and then my mother, and then my father. I was an only child and it left all the parental care to me. I frequently had younger friends that used me as a mom or big sister that helped them get themselves back on, or stay on, track.

As a hospice nurse you did see real pain every day, but something that you don't seem to realize is that your pain is just as real. Sometimes it may or may not be as severe, but it is just as real. You are having the exact same thing happening to you as was happening to them - the experience of pain.

There is no reason to feel guilty about not being able to do as much as you used to. It is a disease that does rob a lot of our energy from us, as well as inflict us with pain that seems to have no cause. If you were to have gotten into a car accident and lost a leg, would you call yourself lazy for not being able to walk upstairs to put clothes away? If you were to have lost a hand would you call yourself a low life for not being able to type as fast? I doubt that you would. And now, the thing to keep in mind is that you have a disease that gives us as much hassle as if one of those things had happened.

Once you learn what your priorities are and how to manage your time and energy effectively, your self image will probably change. You will start to understand that you are doing what you can and when you can. And with keeping yourself active at a lower level all the time, you will find that you're accomplishing more than if you abuse the hell out of your body one day and then do nothing for the next several.

I know that before I was diagnosed, I had noticed that my cramping and physical pain had increased before starting the monthly joy. When I was younger I had horrible horrible cramps, and then as I got older they became less and less. The pain started getting worse every month after I was pretty severely injured while moving a chest freezer up a flight of stairs. (Which is what I think actually brought the fibro symptoms to the surface) After that injury my cramping and aching got to the point where i literally could not get off the bed. I had what felt like charley horses running all through the hips, tops and insides of the thighs. It got to the point where I had talked to my gynecologist she performed what is called endometrial ablation. Now I still get some of the hormones and crankiness, but I don't go through anywhere near the physical pain since there's no lining in the uterus for the body to try and slough off.

I'm sorry that this has been a really long post, but I wanted to at least get it across to you that just because you're not as active, or not as strong as you were - it does not mean that you are any less of anything than what you were before these symptoms. You are still a rather useful human being and through this adversity you will learn that you have other positive things that may come to the surface. I'm sure that you are not talent-less. I'm sure that you have a brain. And you are still young enough to be able to try and find a new path that's close enough to what you used to do for a living. (I can tell you that you're young enough cause I'm the exact same age).

Hope this helps to make you realize that there are people out there just like you and that we're all pulling for you. We are not just crumpled up pieces of people that should be wadded up and tossed into a corner. We are all trying to do the same thing, to make our quality of life better.

Take care of yourself, and as you learn more about what this is, the easier it is to cope with it. There are a lot of people here that can give a lot of good suggestions and pats on the head to let you know that you are still worthwhile regardless of what your physical capabilities are.

DMax,

 

Your post is very interesting-for a lot of reasons.  First of all, welcome to a place where you can find info, incredible support, and it's perfectly fine if you need to vent.   The great thing about this family is that we all get it-we know what you are going through.

 

Anyway...you sound a lot like me (minus the kids).  We are almost the same age-I'm 36-and I think I've been suffering with this for awhile.  I had to laugh when you talked about your house being messy.  My mom is a complete Martha Stewart neat freak, and I've always been a packrat.  But, since the fibro symptoms hit, I feel like a total slob at times.  My mom visited me in April, and she really cleaned this place up-and I've been trying so hard to keep it up.  Personally, I think I've done a darn good job, but I'm sure my mom would say it is a pigsty.

 

Speaking of my mom...she is also a hospice nurse (actually, she finally got off the road and is working in the hospital in palliative care-but I still consider her a hospice nurse since she did it for over 20 years), but just can't get it through her head that I am actually sick and in horrible pain.  I mean-a nurse doesn't get that her own daughter needs help!   LOL-can you talk to her?  Maybe she'd listen to you.  She's begged me for years to move back home (I'm in SoCal, she's in SC) and once I finally agreed, it's like she's stalling.  I'm on disability, so I am constantly struggling to keep my head above water (actually, right now I'm drowning!).  It took me a long time to ask her for help (I'm VERY stubborn), and now she's blowing me off-at least that's the way I feel.

 

But, enough about me.  I just wanted to welcome you to the family.  Stick around long enough and you'll figure out that I'm a babbler-if you haven't figured that out already!