About the Fibro Fight

“There is nothing physically wrong with your back”, the doctor says. How can that possibly be? Surely the excruciating and debilitating pain I feel on a regular basis has got to be caused by something?

In January 2020 I was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia, a condition I’d only heard of once before when a doctor had suggested it to me. Fibromyalgia is a chemical imbalance in the brain which means that the nervous system is hypersensitive essentially meaning that my brain perceives pain where there is physically no damage. I’ve suffered with Fibromyalgia for around 12 years now – diagnosis takes a long time as there is no test for it but many of the symptoms are part of my daily life.

The condition is thought to affect 1 in 25 people and around 7 times as many women as men. Whilst not well-known, it has recently hit headlines as Kirsty Young has taken a sabbatical from Desert Island Discs due to the condition and Lady Gaga also cancelled a tour in 2017 as she managed her Fibromyalgia symptoms. I’m glad that there are celebrities out there who are willing to put the condition on the map but there is far more research that needs to be done in terms of management and the cause of it which can be achieved through raising awareness.

How does Fibromyalgia affect me?

There are many ways in which my Fibromyalgia affects me. It has its ups and downs but the worst symptoms are chronic fatigue (waking up after an 8 hour sleep and still feeling exhausted) and severe leg pain which can often mean that I struggle to move at all and can even end up in floods of tears when trying to do simple tasks such as the washing up. I can also experience tremors in various muscles which can be very uncomfortable – today I have had them in my arm and hand.

Why am I writing this blog and what do I hope to achieve?

Since being diagnosed I have done a vast amount of research on the condition because I feel that truly understanding it is the best way to manage it. Through doing this I have been surprised by the lack of information out there surrounding the condition and particularly conversations between sufferers given that it is not particularly rare. I hope that I can generate a narrative about an invisible illness that may help other sufferers but may also help me to cope with learning to live with and manage chronic pain through an outlet to share my experiences and reaching out to others. I also hope to shine a light on something that is very difficult to understand if you are not a sufferer yourself and that deserves more recognition as a debilitating condition.