Why I Don't Ask 'Why Me?' In Relation to My Fibromyalgia

Firstly, I want to say that I don’t for a second judge anyone who does have “why me” feelings about their chronic illnesses. After all, they’re relentless and cruel and a daily struggle. This is just my personal story and feelings about my fibromyalgia.

By the time I was diagnosed in my early 20s, I was already familiar with this dark cloud I carried with me. It may have been nameless, but my life revolved around it just the same. Not only the pain and fatigue, but also the myriad different symptoms such as light/noise sensitivities and numerous pulled/sprained muscles and ligaments. My loved ones knew all about it too because throughout my life, they’d seen me cancel plans with them, miss time from school/university/work and had helped me on my worst days.

My diagnosis was a relief in the end, a kind of validation of everything I’d spent my life telling all of the medical professionals I had seen (which was a lot). After living with it my whole life and now being able to understand it a little more, I gave it lots of thought and decided it was just a random part of life that couldn’t be prevented. At this point, a big portion of the guilt that comes with chronic illness and its limitations went away. Prior to this I was constantly feeling “less than” those around me and that I was somehow to blame or just not good enough.

Now that I understood it to be arbitrary, that it could affect anyone from any walk of life, I accepted it a bit more as inevitable. My burden to carry, just as others carry their own.

It was at this point I decided that to ask “why me?” was a pointless exercise. Instead I asked, “why not me?” After all, I’m no more important or special than anyone else, and if someone had to have this pain and struggle imposed upon them, I was glad it was me and not my husband, sister, mother or father. I’d take it over and over again if it spares them the endless fight, and I can do it because I have a great support system. I hope all of you reading this have the same. Thank you for your time. Sending love to you all.

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