Women and Fibromyalgia

” So, like a forgotten fire, a childhood can always flare up again within us”, Gaston Bachelard

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“One’s life has value so long as one attributes value to the life of others, by means of love, friendship, indignation and compassion”, Simone deBeauvoir

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 “Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please”, Mark Twain

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“Men are from Earth, women are from Earth. Deal with it”, George Carlin

To-day one of my favourite comedians died. I shall miss his humour and while I obviously agree with Carlin’s view that both men and women are from earth, I cannot be quite so cavalier about dealing with many known differences. Sensitivity and empathy, for example, are human emotions that are often expressed very differently among men and women and both of these affect or may even be responsible for fibromyalgia.

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“Bridge is essentially a social game, but unfortunately it attracts a substantial number of antisocial people”, Alan Truscott

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” Things are going to get a lot worse before they get worse” , Lily Tomlin

I am weary. Try as much as I can, I cannot find many fibromyalgia researchers who are willing to stop this endless search for a medical cause of fibromyalgia! So many seem keen on trying to force the Cinderella slipper on the wrong foot! WHY IS THIS? It can’t be for research grants to enhance careers, but can it be that there is a naive hope of finding a ‘cure’. But, wait, I don’t mean to imply that all the researchers are cold hearted and don’t want to find a ‘cure’! Of course they do, who wouldn’t? But how about the ’cause’ question? Back and forth we go between cause and cure.

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“Question everything”, Maria Mitchell

Frustrated that there is not much hope for relief from the usual medical system and its approach to fibromyalgia, many turn for help to practitioners who provide either complementary or alternative medicine (C/AM). The differences between the latter two is an artifical separation since they both entail using concoctions, therapies, herbs, or homeopathic remedies that are one and the same. The more interesting issue is how  they differ from the traditional scientific ‘western’ medical approach, or what has been known as ’allopathic’ medicine, or now commonly referred to as ‘evidence based medicine’ (EBM) of health care. However, within this discussion I do not refer to EBM as within the domain of CAM as many ‘alternate’ practitioners are prone to do.

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“It is not our differences that divide us. It is our inability to recognize, accept, and celebrate those differences”, Audre Lorde 

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“Lack of activity destroys the good condition of every human being, while movement and methodical physical exercise save it and preserve it”, Plato 

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“I’m not confused, I’m just well mixed”, Robert Frost 

How sad it is that this invisible dis-ease that affects primarily women (although many more men and children are reported to be experiencing FMS than before) has led to so much continued confusion about causation. The theories about the cause of fibromyalgia have preoccupied researchers for the past several decades, partcularly as the numbers of reported cases have risen dramatically.

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“There is no part of my life, upon which I can look back without pain”, Florence Nightingale 

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“Every person who has mastered a profession is a skeptic concerning it” , George Bernard Shaw 

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“You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ’I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.’ You must do the thing you think you cannot do” , Eleanor Roosevelt

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“In the spring I have counted one hundred and thirty-six different kinds of weather inside of four and twenty hours”, Mark Twain 

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“Being a woman is hard work”, Maya Angelou. 

There can be little doubt that fibromyalgia has become very prominent as a serious social and personal condition that affects primarily women. In fact, it is said by some that it is an epidemic of great proportions. Loss of work, physical impairments and challenges, intense pain, decreased income for many, increases in medication consumption, burdens on the health care systems and family disruptions are among the many serious outcomes of this debilitating syndrome. The numbers of people, mostly women, often middle age-aged, who suffer from this condition far outnumber the numbers of those who suffer from such a horrific life threatening disease as HIV/AIDS, even though fibromyalgia is not in and of itself a threat to life. While I do not suggest that comparisons should be made,  or pitting one bitter struggle against another, nonetheless, both HIV/AIDS and fibromyalgia suffer from social stigma, as did the tuberculosis epidemic of decades ago.

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“Stress is an ignorant state. It believes that everything is an emergency”, Natalie Goldberg 

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“If your teeth are clenched and your fists are clenched, your lifespan is probably clenched”, Adabella Radici 

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Eating can be one of life’s greatest joys. Eating for comfort can have an immediate effect on our moods, and it can often result in guilt. Eating can be a social event, or it can be done in private. Eating is sometimes only done to keep one alive. Eating a specific way is often done to either reduce weight, or gain weight. Eating often reflects cultural and ethnic backgrounds, and can be a way to show love to others. Eating and dieting go hand in hand and can bring about hope. So, is there hope for those who have fibromyalgia that in eating  particular kinds of food, and abstaining from others will bring about much needed relief? Is it realistic to give advice across the realm to those with FMS without taking individual factors into consideration?

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“We also often add to our own pain and suffering by being overly sensitive, over-reacting to minor things, and sometimes taking things too personally”, Tenzin Gyatso, The 14th Dali Lama quote 

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“Am I alone in my egotism when I say that never does the pale light of dawn filter through the blinds of 52 Tavistock Square but I open my eyes and exclaim “Good God! Here I am again” not always with pleasure, often with pain, sometimes in a spasm”, Virginia Woolf 

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