Throughout my life I have always tried to stay healthy and fit. Although, one thing I have always struggled with is stress and anxiety. When I was younger it wasn't such a big deal, but when I got older it began to really effect me physically. During work I started to notice different symptoms showing up, such as sensitive ears, sinus pressure, cold hands, neck ache, lower back ache, dizzy spells, etc. These symptoms would come and go.
Then about a year ago BAM! it hit me all at once! I started to feel every symptom that could possibly happen. It started off with itchy scalp, than I started to feel a lot of pain on the top of my head. It felt like my scalp was burnt, but I wasn't because at this time I wasn't going outside. Then my hair started falling out more than usual, I was starting to worry. Later, my eyes started to quickly shift back and forth every once and a while, then my foot started hurting as if I injured it. At this point I was in bad shape, the back of my neck and top of my head was giving me the worst pain ever, it was like I was hit really hard with something. I couldn't even touch it, it was so tender to the touch. My ears became very sensitive to the point that any sound would scare me and I was getting worse as the days went by. The next thing I knew, I was in pain from head to toe. Every morning I woke up feeling as if I was hit by a bus and I wasn't getting any better. My whole body felt brittle and my hands and feet hurt like never before. Yet, the scariest part of this experience was when I tried to fall asleep. I closed my eyes and as I started dozing off an uncontrollable serge shot through my body. This continuously happened every time I tried to fall asleep. I remember sleeping about 3 hours that night. By this point I was scared, my senses and nervous system seemed to be out of whack. My ears were sensitive, my eyesight was getting blurry and for the first time in my life I had a panic attack. My heart started beating really hard, I felt sick and I couldn't make it go away. That day I gave up coffee. As the day went on, I was scared just thinking about how I was going to have to go to sleep soon. This scared me because my experience from the previous night was not the best. As I closed my eyes and started to doze off my whole body started to shake, kind of like seizer, I didn't sleep much that night either. The next night my body started to jerk every time I would try to fall asleep. When I finally did go to sleep I woke up with my eyes moving back and forth really fast accompanied with flashes of light. I didn't know what was happening to me, but what I did know is that there were new symptoms everyday and I was still not getting better. I was in pain everyday. I visited the emergency room, on many occasions, only to find out that each Dr. I spoke to said the same thing 'fibromyalgia'. The first time I heard it was fibromyalgia it gave me a sense of relief to know that what ever was happening to me had a name. Although, I was still not getting better and everyday I was losing hope. The only help I was receiving from Drs. was a little piece of paper with a prescription on it. Aside from the pain, the most challenging part of this experience was that I don't like taking medication. I know that it helps and I am so thankful for it, but at the time I wasn't having it. I was prescribed things from depression medication, pain medication, to ant-seizer medication. My medication cabinet was fully stocked... I was just waiting to open up for business. ; )
Anyway, one day I thought ok I want to be happy and not live in pain for the rest of my life, so I gave in. I started on a muscle relaxant and ibuprofen. It helped, but I went through a lot of other medications to get to the ones that worked best for me. The other ones either dilated my pupils, made me extremely tired, depressed or made me feel some other type of symptoms. I was thankful for the ones I ended up taking in the end because they did help. So for 5 months I took this medication, along with a little physical therapy and daily stretching. Now I just went off the medication and am in the transition to a more holistic approach and doing better. Whew, are you still with me? & I gave you the shorter version!
-Come visit soon for more updates on my life.
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