Fibromyalgia: A Real Pain In The....

I want to take the opportunity to discuss a topic that is extremely important to me. It is a disease called FIBROMYALGIA, and it's a pain in the ass... and everywhere else for that matter.

This disease affects 900,000 Canadians and most of them are women... and most of them are over the age of 40 (as my doc told me). I was diagnosed with it at 16. Now with most things... take the olympics for example, people are so impressed when the announcer says "the youngest competitor to ever take to the floor, her parents must be so proud". For fibromyalgia, it was as if that announcer said "congratulations, you've just won a life of constant pain, and guess what - because you're the youngest, you get to live with it even longer than most!"

My friend Meaghan just recently wrote a paper on this disease for her Women in the Modern World class and I couldn't have been happier that she did. She explains the symptoms well when she says:

The most common symptom is pain. Some victims describe their pain as deep muscular aching, burning, throbbing, stabbing and even numbness. Often, the pain and stiffness are worse in the mornings and may hurt more in muscle groups that are used repetitively

Along with the pain, comes issues sleeping, intestinal problems and depression. Doesn't this sound lovely? Well it gets even better.

The best part about this disease (please hear the sarcasm in my voice) is that people - including doctors - do not understand the disease. There are no outward signs of it and nothing can be seen when x-rays are done because the pain stems from the soft tissues of the body. Doctors often mis-diagnose it and friends and family members never really "get it", insisting that you're: lazy, a party-pooper, faking it, exaggerating, just tired... or various other condescending phrases.

To these people, I say: Fuck. Off.

I'm sorry, but until you can tell me that every day you wake up in physical pain, that you spend your entire day in some sort of pain and that every night you go to bed, aching from the day you've just had - you cannot tell me I'm ANYTHING but legit for wanting a little bit of a break.

Want to know what makes it even more fun? Stress makes it worse.

At this point in the year I don't think that I could be more stressed... I wrote a list a few posts ago but now, as it comes down to the wire with performances, essays, exams and rehearsals... I feel like my body is about to fall apart.

No, I'm not looking for pity by writing this post. I just wanted to write - to vent - and let people know that no, I'm not just upset because I'm PMSing (which I'm not at the moment in case you felt you needed to know), I'm not in pain because I just wore the wrong shoes, and I'm not just feeling ill because of meal hall... I have this disease and right now it's beating the shit out of me. Yes, I'll jump back and be the perky me once again but for now... just understand there's more to my "laziness" than meets the eye.