How I "Caught" Fibromyalgia

How it all started...

While fibro is not something you can contract from another person or persons there are links to it being hereditary. I believe my paternal grandmother, my mother and father all suffered from it but it was at a time long before anyone ever thought to diagnose this syndrome. 


My sister also had fibro. She was the first diagnosed person that I knew who suffered from it and it was that diagnosis that first brought my attention to this chronic condition. Because she had the illness I researched it, trying to find something that might help her. I recognized that I probably had a "touch of it" but did not want to admit that I was experiencing the same illness she had because it seemed to anger her that I would say such a thing. She told me I could not possibly have fibro because my symptoms were not completely the same as hers. Had she only known then what I know now, but she never will as she has passed on.

Took me a while but I found an "evil" butterfly. The ones that usually are used for Fibro are so cute or pretty-there is nothing cute or pretty about Fibro! I needed an evil butterfly to represent my dis-ease.

    

So many things have been linked to fibro. There are so many ways to set our bodies up for becoming a fibromyalgia survivor.  I get tired just thinking about them! I think I was in the midst of a perfect storm just waiting for the final straw to break the proverbial camel's back. There were so many things that happened in my life that lead up to its final breakdown or "catching" of the "evil purple butterfly".

I had the hereditary link first. Then I suffered multiple types of abuse as a child and was in a constant state of anxiety for most of my life. The difference between my anxiety and that of a lot of other people is that I was able to channel it in a way that made me seem like I was very capable and successful even when I never felt it was so. I always felt lacking and as if I never did enough or could be enough no matter how hard I tried or how many laurels I accrued. Anyone who saw me probably thought I was just a Type A personality and a real go getter. Little did they know that my mind was a whirlwind of worse case scenarios that I was trying to avoid in any way I could.

Next came the stress from having a child that was molested and knowing I did not protect him because I was not "good enough" to know it happened. Then we topped it off with a divorce from the man I thought I would be with for life,  remarriage to an abuser and the rape that left me scarred but not broken. I remarried again after divorcing the abuser and was quite content and happy for quite some time. It seemed the universe was unable to accept that I was finally happy though. I had a very bad break of my leg and ankle that resulted in what, I believe, was my first real fibro "encounter."

I never felt the same after that accident. No matter how hard I tried I just could not get back to my old "self."  On the outside I was absolutely the same to everyone and anyone who knew me but I felt a shift. I knew I was "not right" but could not put my finger on it. I knew I ached and was tired a lot of the time but I blamed my weight gain while I recovered from my accident and the subsequent surgeries. I also started having issues with sleep and found myself having to exhaust myself completely in order to find the "land of nod." Then there was the IBS that started to bother me off and on. I figured it was "something I ate" since IBS does not really come and go, after all and the doctors could not find anything "wrong" so it had to be that or that it was "in my head."

But life goes on and so did I. I got back to being as normal as possible and blamed the twinges in my leg for everything I was feeling. I even got successful once again to the outside world, volunteered at a non-proifit equine rescue where I became the VP on the board of directors along with helping with the rehabbing and retraining of severely abused and neglected horses. I was acting like all was well and right even when it wasn't. It was "all in my head" after, all. I just needed an anti-depressant according to the doctors but I refused.

I knew I was not depressed. I had a run in with depression after my son's molestation. I knew what depression was and this was NOT it. Life was pretty good and I was accepting the "new normal" because I was "getting older" and "fat" so that must be it.  "It's all good," I told myself....

Until the second accident. The one that left me in a place I did not even recognize....

To Be Continued.....


Part 2 of the journey continues HERE