Let's Talk Fibromyalgia
Fibromyalgia is a disorder characterized by widespread musculoskeletal pain accompanied by fatigue, sleep, memory and mood issues. It is often triggered by a stressful event, including physical stress or emotional stress. Possible triggers for the condition can include an injury or a viral infection.
Fibromyalgia has many symptoms and these tend to vary person to person but the main symptom is widespread pain. This pain may be felt throughout your body, but could be worse in particular areas, such as your back or neck. That pain is likely to be continuous, although it may be better or more severe at different times. The pain could feel like an ache, a burning or sharp, stabbing. It is often accompanied by fatigue and altered sleep, memory, and mood and muscle tenderness.
If you have fibromyalgia, you may find that even the slightest touch is painful. This extreme or hyper sensitivity will often be described in the following medical terms:
hyperalgesia – an extremely sensitive to pain
allodynia – pain is felt from something that should not be painful at all, such as a very light touch, bed sheets or a shower
And you may also be sensitive to environmental things like smoke, certain foods and bright lights. With that exposure to something you're sensitive causing your other fibromyalgia symptoms to flare up.
Having fibromyalgia can also make you feel stiff. This stiffness may be most severe when you have been in the same position for a long period of time – for example, when you first wake up in the morning or if you’ve been sitting at a desk for hours at a time. This, in turn, can cause your muscles to spasm.
And fibromyalgia can cause extreme fatigue. This excessive tiredness can range from a mild fatigue to the all out exhaustion experienced during an illness like a bad flu. The severe fatigue can often come on suddenly, draining you of all your energy. When this happens, you feel too tired to do anything at all.
This in turn can affect your sleep. You will often wake up tired, even when you have had plenty of sleep. The reason for this is because the condition of fibromyalgia can sometimes prevent you sleeping deeply enough to refresh your system properly. This is described as non-restorative sleep.
The lack of sleep then can begin a cycle of cognitive problems — issues related to mental processes, such as thinking and learning. You may have:
trouble remembering and learning new things
problems with attention and concentration
slowed or confused speech
As mentioned at the start, the symptoms of fibromyalgia differ from person to person. Other symptoms people sometimes experience include:
dizziness and clumsiness
feeling too hot or too cold – because you're not able to regulate your body temperature properly
an overwhelming urge to move your legs (restless legs syndrome)
tingling, numbness, prickling or burning sensations in your hands and feet (pins and needles)
in women, painful periods
anxiety
depression
The need for better defining care and long-term support for patients with fibromyalgia is urgent. In particular, it is important to ensure a proper and prompt diagnosis. According to a study published in Arthritis Care & Research, when it comes to health care experiences, those diagnosed with fibromyalgia reported fewer positive experiences compared to the other groups, even when compared to chronic pain.
In fact, when compared to the fibromyalgia groups, the chronic pain group was more likely to report a “satisfied” category when asked about quality of life. Another socioeconomic difference among the groups was that participants in the fibromyalgia group were significantly more likely to be unemployed due to the adverse impact of symptoms on their health.
Further, the fibromyalgia group was less likely to agree with the statement “that (their) care was very or extremely helpful in dealing with the problem(s) (they) sought help for”. The diagnosed fibromyalgia group was less likely to endorse the statement “that (they) had been given clear and understandable information about (their) symptoms and care”. In comparison, even the chronic pain group score was low but more likely to agree!