Sunday, November 11, 2012

A New Day A New Me

     So all this time I have had this blog and not written anything on it really. This partly do to the fact that I could not see myself coming up with fun articles on making jewelry everyday. Then I realized just because the blog is The Wild Tangent doesn't mean every single article has to be jewelry related. I am The Wild Tangent. So I have decided to start using this blog and I will write some on jewelry I am sure but I will also be writing on a lot of other subjects as well. I hope that everyone will enjoy it and try to look over the more obvious grammatical errors as I do not have grammar check on my pc. :)
      A little bit on me I am almost 34 married have 3 amazing children two who I miss every single moment and one that lives with me. I was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia in 2008 after years of back and neck problems sustained in a car accident on July 13, 2005. I plan on writing several posts on fibromyalgia and my journey to become a better me. I watched a video recently and what the Dr. said really hit home he said, "You can't say no to the pain but you can say no to the suffering." After months of my fibro worsening to the point that I feel awful 24 hours a day everyday I needed a new approach to my condition.  
     For those of you who are unaware fibromyalgia is  a condition that causes chronic muscle pain, stiffness skin sensitivity, and soreness. It also effects your mood, memory, and mobility.  In the video they explained it best when a  regular person uses their arm to wave the muscles take turns to accomplish the wave. When a person with fibromyalgia attempts the same action the muscle try to work at the same time essentially working against each other which causes strain and fatigue. It hurts to be touched most days even gentle hugs can be excruciatingly painful. My shoulders and arms fatigue fast. I have not been able to curl my hair in years. My arm cant do the motion, such a simple task yet virtually impossible for someone suffering with fibromyalgia. 
     After watching several videos on the disease a couple things became clear to me. The first is my hunch about sleep was correct, it is essential for fibromyalgia suffers to get deep restful sleep.  The sad part is fibromyalgia destroys your sleep. I can lay their and wake up every 45 minutes all night long until after 7 am the only good sleep I get is between the hours 7am and 3 pm.  The shocking part in the video was the other sufferers have the same sleep schedule. They too complain of waking up every forty-five minutes and say their best sleep occurs after 7 am. The other big topic issue is exercise.  I spent an hour pulling weeds and ended up with strains in both hamstrings so severe that I could barely walk.  It is hard to exercise when your body feels like you have been beaten with a 2x4 all over. Yet in this video they suggested starting out at 5 minutes a day and gradually increase it. They also said as soon as you feel fatigued or start hurting to much stop. People with fibro can over do it and end up laid up for weeks so half the challenge is listening to your body. This was not information I had been previously given. Just 5 minutes even I can do that. So for part of the new me is that I have promised myself to start exercising starting tomorrow. (today I cleared a space to do it in) I will be starting slow just 5 minutes using my wii like I originally intended when I got it. The difference is I know now that when I start hurting to much its time to stop.
     Another thing I will be doing is trying to keep track of how I feel.  All to often it is easy for us with fibro to do to much on our good days because we feel bad about how little we do on our bad days. I want to turn over a new leaf and not feel bad about the limitations my body has. So I hope if you know someone with fibro or have it yourself you will join me and maybe we can all start feeling better together. :)