Salt and Pepper.....1

So with this mornings pain and agony....I pushed myself to undress and struggle to get into the shower..
My arms were like lead weights once again...and the pain radiated immediently from within my elbows as I raised my arms to begin the ritual of the hair wash process.

I recently purchased pump packs in my favorite natural shampoo and conditioner...it really helps not to have to hold any thing with my hands...the chore of washing my hair is sometimes nearly unbearable...and I can't even complete the whole process....some mornings...like this morning...I had washed...a little but my hands hurt so much...and then the pins and needles came...and I hadn't even washed out the shampoo....
I reached for my trusty bathroom stool....I just had to sit in the shower and allow the shampoo to run out...and over my body...without the assistance of my hands...I needed to save what strength was left for drying my self....and dressing to prepare for work.....My new day had begun....

After this...and some girly chats today...I have decided...to make one of the biggest decisions I have made.I must be so vain!! Because it's really effecting me...and is a huge deal to me...so...firstly you need to know I am 42 and have fairly dark...nearly black hair...probably shoulder length and very thick.Now its so dark that it freaks me out when I have horrific grey hair come shooting through as it does....so like many women of today...I dye it....simply because I'm not ready to be grey just yet.

But there are significant changes in the wind in this house hold....today is the day I have decided I am not going to dye my hair any more! And tomorrow I am going to the hairdresser to get it cut  really short...in hope the transition from this to that....or pepper to salt....  In hope it Happens a little quicker....and a little less painlessly...

I hope to embrace the new me...and know that I will no longer be pouring such. Chemicals Into my body each month....maybe it will help my fibro pain?????

I'm really scared....of how it will look as it transitions..... But I am being really positive about the eventual outcome....which at the max will be 4-6months.... It will be so much easier for my hands...less work to style.etc...and no more chemicals....so my hands are going go be forever eternally greatful!!
Oh and the other big thing about my decision is I haven't told hubby....he has nagged me for years to stop dying my hair and go....gracefully grey....as he puts it...ha ha...(lets see how graceful he really thinks it is)

I know I will not sleep tonight as I prepare for the big chop....but I will remind myself....it's for the greater good....my hands...and arms....and better wellbeing.....


Salt and pepper here I come..........will keep you posted....

F is for Fear.....

A spoon or two....

I've been really fortunate and actually had a little sleep during the night...
I awoke to immediently know it's either going to be again really hot....or the weather has changed....

All I did was open my eyes...upon lying still I could feel the intense pain and firy inferno in both of my feet...both arms feel like lead weights and each elbow area is very painful...shoulderblades pain is already peaking around a hospital scale of a 7....and all I've done is just moved my eye muscles for the day....and its early on a Sunday morning...it's lovely and quiet in my home...im relaxed cause I've actually slept a little....and this is the beginning of my new day...

My unwanted visitor sensed a change in weather very early thismorning and has arrived to stay for a Sunday visit I think....

As I look out the Window its grey and it's cooler looking and it makes me feel better knowing its going to cool down some what this coming week,after the past weeks events...

Once the barametic pressure settles so will my unwanted visitor....

Anyway...I was considering what my options were to begin the day with...I thought I could massage my feet with some elmore oil..but then that would use up a spoon or two of mine...If any of you know the spoon theory....(I will come back to that)and will leave me with less usage in my hands....which when you are home alone...is not a good option....holding....pouring...tying...cutting..would not be an option if I was to massage my own feet....so....I might soak them in Epsom salts, then wrap them in a hot pack and see if that reduces the pain and awful sensations enough to walk around and be able to enjoy my day....

I will have to hope the break  meds help with the rest of the pain...and im relaxing with the cat and listening to some Ed Sheeran good relaxation...or distraction method....

For those that are reading and have Fibro...and want to explain what it's like to family and friends...or other loving people taking the time to understand by reading this blog...this spoon theory written by this incredible women who actually doesn't have Fibro but Lupus...has come up with this theory...when I read it I cried...it was so exactly what it is truly like...
Each and every day!!
Please read its great...and sad...but it makes sense....

http://www.butyoudontlooksick.com/articles/written-by-christine/the-spoon-theory/

So....not long....and I may have previously mentioned that I will be finally undergoing my muscle and nerve testing.... In hope for some answers... Things have been progressively been deteriorating...and in silence....Shhhh.... so I may not like the outcome but I am now at a place where I am as prepared as I can be for what will be.... I need now to be able to have the medical professional. Tackle whatever is actually happening alongside my fibro...my pain specialist has mentioned several times it is very difficult to treat whilst we don't know what else is going on...

I'm gearing up for my testing on the 24th...so of coarse will keep you all posted...and hope for some type of progress....

I have one thing on my side.... Love and support....it will not only get me to the appointment but pull me....or possibly drag me back out the other end....dependant on results....good or bad I suppose....people are amazing....and I think they are gifted with love, strength and compassion....and I can say amongst the chaos of this condition...
The sadness it brings...the unpredictability....and relentlessness....

Love is there....and amongst everything sad and bitter in my life that this condition has brought with it...
I have love around me.....
A little sprinkled here....and a little sprinkled there....just like magic fairy dust....it's what keeps me going....even if the fairy dust is via phone link....sms....

Hugs and kisses to my special little group of unique people that put up with my daily shit...your all amazing...and I love you....even ...I know some of you don't read this....but that's okay too....it's pretty sad...particular when you live it.


F is for....Future .....

Ghastly Heat 2....

I was knocked over by the intensity of my unwanted visitor "Fibromyalgia" last night.
The sudden arrival...intensity and unexpectancy of the volume of how he overtook my whole being...without question....hesitation...or...interruption...

Intensity high on the hospital scale it was a 9 and I felt flattened by the ragging pain within my chest,jaw and the entirety of my body.

The overwhelming feeling of coarse came from the chest ,rib and jaw pain...its allways the most severe...and overcomes not only my physical being but my emotional too.

So poor hubby was so concerned and was wanting to ring an ambulance but I was being really strong....well...I was trying to...
After last year when I had up to three trips to hospital a month... And last November I spent ten days in there...All for my Fibromyalgia... So my promise to myself was to avoid it at all costs since weaning off the oxcycontin they had previously given me...and the hellish place it had previously sent me too...

So...trying to be strong...brave...and again hold it together again....night has fallen ..and so has my fibro friend...into my chest and jaw again tonight...for consecutive nights now....
My strength has wained...and im feeling like its getting harder to fight the fight....Im lying in the cool out of the heat...and I've been relaxing...I've used my relaxation CD to fight my unwanted visitor but today he's stronger...so trying a bit of pet therapy...playing my my eight week old kitten "Bella"as a distraction...

Medication has not made any change in level of pain tonight...my new medication Topamax has not yet made any change in the pain levels either...I am seeing pain specialist in March so am going to increase dosage in hope of any change....

This heat is really challenging my strength...

I have pushed myself...made an effort with my presentation inhope that it would somehow make me feel a little better...brighter...and keep reminding myself...I am NOT standing on the sidelines this year... And that I am going to participate in life this year....

But....this ghastly heat is making it very challenging...

This illness brings its challenges...and along the way you certainly find out who true friends are.The ones that truly care....the ones that actually visit...and understand....that don't have high expectations of you....ones that remember that they are your friends in both good and bad times...

The people that like you when your having better days and be be more sociable..

The people that turn a blind eye when they can see your struggling to pour (due to weight)the milk....into the coffees your making for others...

Or your walking with others and you can't quite keep

Anyway....my Fibro fingers are very painful and can no longer write...so....

F is for....Frustration.....

Ghastly Heat....

Goshhhh....it's been so so hot....and my very unwanted visitor has actually moved in!!

He seems to have a permanent position somewhere within my left ribs...ouch is about all I can say...it feels as though my husband has accidently reversed his milk tanker over me...or something horrific like that....someday the pain is just undescribable....and I actually just can't even really take a deep breath...it sounds creepy if your standing near me....and I'm deep breathing....Ha Ha...
Allways concious of this...it's really weird but the pain truely grabs your breath as you breath....it's so severe....

Anyway....it's the heats.fault....and I hate it....since the heat has arrived so has my visitor...and he won't leave...at all!!! I haven't had an hrs break for days now....usually I can have afew hrs break!!!but at the moment he is just being so persistent...and its as if he's throwing a party....brought some friends....and this is what they do when they visit...they...make me have severe pins and needles in my hands until they become numb for long periods of time...it can be for hrs at a time....and by the evening when my poor body is so fatigue by them all they really pump up the music...and then I get an inner tremor...Through my bum check...down my leg...it just feels like it's going through me....yes ...I could liken to....just like that ridiculous  vibration of music you sometimes sit beside thumping and buzzing out of a pimpted up black shinny car...at a set of traffic lights...that goes screeching past you...you know the one....or it is sometimes red...cause red goes fast too....

No rest for the wicked they say....not even when your physically exhausted...and emotionally drained...my body still won't rest....it just tremors away quietly.....inside me....like my body is a tomb....and its trying to escape....

But through it all I'm trying to stay focused....im not sitting on the sidelines this year....thats my promise to myself..

I'm going to participate in life this year....

Resonating pain....

Todays weather forecast was was predicting a high of 42 degree scorcher....and all I could imagine before the day had even began was how this would impact upon my fibro ridden body.

I was at at work and little did people know...
My spine actually felt as though someone had the largest vegatable peeler known to man kind....and very unlikely peeled a thick layer of skin off my spin....it felt so raw from the pain that I felt from the top to the bottom....just the simple light touch of the brush of my office chair against it felt like an intense inferno....

About that time a colleague actually said..you seem to be doing so much better these days....
Hmmmmmm...I took one of those big swallows...when you know your about to loose it.....and I said...actually the pain is just the same as it has allways been...
She said....what strategies are you using.....implying I seem so much better....(which was nice)it was then my eyes filled with tears and I struggled with my words and said....I'm just dealing with it a little differdntly emotionally these  days.....im more excepting of the condition....it's not going to change...so I do have to get used to living like this....

With that I said.....But I can't talk about it or this happens.....and began to cry a little....but was brave for it was just a moment in time.....

It's then I noticed...it's the unspokenwords....they are kind of ok....they sit there...in your mind....and in your head....yet when .they are spoken....and are loud....and carry a sound....and resonate around you and become loud and then real....they hurt!! And they bring the tears....and the pain.....even if only for a moment.....

So bloody frustrating that pain lives within me every single day....and of recent times it's friend has been the severe pins and needles....so annoying....

Anyway my resonating pain was not only within my mind....but truly within my body today....the heat effected me so much.Between high level of pain and fatigue today was frustrating....

Positive outcome for today....I did manage to work through some of my report writing today....and settle my new staff member into her new role as well....
And tomorrow is a new day.....and the forecast is not supposed to be in the 40s horray!!!....

F is for .......  Fibromyalgia....