Hi, Griego, and welcome. I use gentle massage and it has helped me a lot. BUT you have to have a massage therapist who knows what they are doing. Mine is fantastic. She belongs to the American Massage Therapy Association. Members have to continue their education in massage in order to be in this organization. My massage therapist is even board certified! Here is a link for anyone that is considering massage. You can find someone near you that is in this organization. Make sure they have studied how to massage fibro patients. Mine has and uses the trigger point massage on me, too. She also know how to massage myofacial pain patients, cancer patients, etc. She has walls full of certificates from the classes she has taken.
http://www.amtamassage.org/findamassage/index.html?utm_source=%2Ffindamassage%2Flocator.aspx&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=redirect
I do trigger point therapy, too, and this really helps. Many times our pain is referred pain. I bought a great book on Amazon all about this. It shows diagrams of where you hurt and where the pain REALLY is coming from. Once I find the knots that are causing the pain, I can work them out. I have been miserable but I just use a tennis ball against a wall and can really lessen and even get rid of pain this way! The name of the book is called The Trigger Point Therapy Workbook. You might be interested in this.
http://www.amazon.com/Trigger-Point-Therapy-Workbook-Self-Treatment/dp/1572243759
We all have different levels of pain and different levels as how we feel pain. Fibro is not a one size fits all illness. Some people do need prescription pain medication. I was fortunate in that when I was diagnosed there wasn't a lot out there for doctors to prescribe. Most hadn't even heard of this illness...it was called fibrositis back then. I was prescribed ibuprofen since it wasn't over the counter back then. It's funny, since fibro isn't an inflammatory illness, but it did help me and I think that's because I had another illness going on too that has just recently been diagnosed. But I only have used ibuprofen and Tylenol for decades. I did develop bleeding ulcers but once they healed I was put back on the ibuprofen and now take a prescription level Pepcid AC to help protect my stomach along with anothe medication called misoprostol. Anyway, this winter, before I was diagnosed with the other illness, I was given Vicodin and when that didn't work, Tramadol. That didn't work either. Neither touched my pain! So I went back to the ibuprofen and Tylenol.
Because I only have been using these things, I searched things out, found out about malic acid/magnesium supplements and vitamin D3. I found Curamin. These each help reduce the pain.
As I said above, massages have helped me BUT having a positive outlook has helped me as much as any of these things. When I read this article, I saw that what they are discovering now is what I have been doing for years and have been passing the info on to people on this forum. Many don't think they can do this because they have been on medication for a while or they are frightened about getting more pain back. I don't blame them one bit. I probably would be the same way. But I do hope some will give some of this a try...even if they are on medication. These things really do help lessen pain. The only thing listed in the article that I didn't have success with was acupuncture. I spent a ton of money on that to no avail. Oh, I also keep moving, do daily gentle exercises like walking, swimming, or yoga, too. All of this helps me function and have a good life in spite of this illness.
Karen, I agree with you about not focusing on the pain. I don't do that either. That's where the positive attitude comes in plus I have certain activities that I can do that causes me to focus on that instead of how I am feeling. I never take a body check. I never ask myself how I'm feeling. If I hurt, there is an explanation....fibromyalgia! I'm doing all I know to do about that so I just keep on keeping on. It's surprising how you can get busy and forget you have this lousy illness. The mind is a very powerful thing.
Sherrine