Fibromyalgia sucks. Being a spoonie sucks. But you already knew that, right?
I've heard from an array of medical professionals that I need to eat well, lose weight, exercise, pace myself and the usual wording. None of this meant anything to me. They couldn't understand the frustration and mourning I was going through, losing everything I was, but that's a story for another day.
January and February 2020 I was hit with an extremely painful gallbladder attack. Not only did I have gallstones, but also an infection which was spreading to the liver. I wasn't in a position I could afford being off work so I worked from home. The antibiotics did the trick but I was still having painful episodes. I was strangely okay with the change in routine. Probably because of the amount of pain I was in. I would sleep, work, maybe eat a small amount. That's it.
Back to work in March now I was feeling a bit better. A few weeks down the line the covid-19 situation escalates so back to working from home. It took just under one week to have a flare in my symptoms, specifically fatigue, brain fog and overall concentration. It took me some time to realise what was going on. It was the change in routine. I thought surely something that small couldn't affect it, right?
Then I broke it down. I was getting up later, going to bed later. The times I was eating changed , the times I was walking changed. The levels of my physical activity changed. The times I had my medication changed. Actually, everything changed.
It wasn't simply me doing some exercise that helped. It was the whole routine. Don't get me wrong, I still had days I felt like death, however it was so much more manageable. My alarm each day. My bus to work. My walk. Lunchtime. Hometime. Dinnertime. Medication. Everything was in a routine and changing this threw my body entirely out of sync to the point it caused a huge fatigue flare.
Everything inside me screamed to stay in bed and sleep all day. So I did for one day. Maybe the sleep helped clear some of that brain fog because that's when it clicked, I've changed everything I did overnight and that's a huge shock to the system.
So the next day, I got up for work, had my pills, introduced a bit more of my physical activity. Within a day I felt my fatigue levels drop. I'm not saying this is how everyone will react but this is when I realised just how important a routine is. Just how strict I have to be with myself.
7 years down the line and I'm still trying to figure this thing out.
#Spoonie #Fibromyalgia #COVID19 #workingfromhome #ChronicFatigue
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