This is where we want your stories, experiences with medication or want to share experiences with other Fibro sufferers, simply send your stories/experiences to us using this link here
ACCEPTANCE, by Lindsay Leonard
Poem, Sister Marion
When you are diagnosed with a chronic health condition like Fibromyalgia it is natural to feel shocked, fearful, upset and confused. For some, as in my case, there is a sense of relief; you now have a name for the long years of suffering, which at times had you ‘ on rock bottom’. However, when that relief fades you can be left feeling quite depressed and for many of us, including myself, life is turned upside down as you have to give up your job, hobbies and sometimes there is a sense of ‘ who am I, what kind of life will I now have?’ Some sufferers tell of losing friends as they continuously turn down offers to socialise, not because they don’t want to go out, but because they know that for them it would be just too much, too big a price to pay—and it takes special friends to really understand that. So look at the friends you have today and be grateful, for they are the true and real friends, people who know you and accept you as you are. This brings me back to the title: Acceptance.
Do we really, truly accept that we have Fibromyalgia? I know I didn’t for some time. I went through stages of denial, false hope, anger, some bitterness and finally despair until I realised I only had one life and it was up to me how that life was going to be. I know that being in touch with a support group was a great help, particularly in the early days, when I didn’t know much about it. Just to know I wasn’t the only person with it was a help! Then there were all the great people I met—and I’m sure you’ll know who I mean. They’re still there today doing so much for one purpose, and for that I give a big thank-you.
It was when I decided how I would use my time, my energy, that life started having meaning again. I’m very determined and am proud of the way I’ve not allowed Fibromyalgia to completely rule my life (though there are still days when I feel it has). I’m now extending my counselling knowledge and training and am almost half way through a Diploma course and am working voluntarily, one day a week, with hours to suit me, at Sunderland Counselling Service, counselling children and adults, who have suffered grief, loss, divorce, bullying, abuse and related issues. In doing intensive course in grief and loss it helped me put my own losses due to FMS in some perspective.
A tutor at Sunderland University, who became my inspiration, helped me enormously with the message: “acceptance does not have to mean approval.”
I’ve also learned to ask for help and not feel I’m weak or a failure. In fact it usually indicates an advanced level of honesty and awareness—and I feel it is more productive to actually know the areas you need help in and ask for it—but show sincere appreciation and not expect it as your right. Also to be kind to yourself, continue to set yourself goals, but make them realistic and manageable for you!
In my reading I came across this from this from C.G.Jung and would like to share it with you:
“You cannot apply kindness and understanding to others if you have not applied it to yourself. This is quite serious. We are never sufficient to ourselves. This is a burden that everybody has to carry: to live the life we have got to live. So be kind to the least of your sisters (or brothers) who is yourself.
How we do this is up to each of us as individuals, but I think the key lies in knowing what it is you can still do, and want to do, in life and valuing that. Yes, there will be difficult times; Fibromyalgia will see to that, but don’t let it beat you every time—you are more than the sum of each part of you and life is worth fighting for! Allow yourself to have bad days, accept them, remember you don’t have to approve of them– then get “back on track”, whatever your track may be and remember you only have one life, one chance; this is not a dress rehearsal, so go for it! There are many thing you can still do—even if it means at a different, slower pace. Make this the season you find out what gives you satisfaction and pleasure. I’ll leave you with a final quote:
“ Acceptance is a feeling of victory, a feeling of peace, of serenity, of positive submission to things we can’t change. Resignation is more a feeling of defeat, of bitterness, of what the use, I’m tired of fighting.”
So please, give acceptance a chance and look forward to the future.
Lindsay Leonard
I wake up in the morning, and as usual I say,
“I wonder where the pain will manifest today!”
“Ah yes-it’s in my right leg and also in my back”
Then I slap the side of my face and cannot feel the slap!
There are also places I cannot really feel
And everything is far away and nothing feels quite real
My head is full of pressure and in a muzzy fog
Then I trip and stumble, as I bump into the dog!
I go and make a coffee, or a mug of boiling tea,
I must be very careful, or I’ll tip it over me.
I find a bruise upon my leg I haven’t seen before,
and my mouth is dry and horrid and my eyes are very sore.
Sometimes, I feel depressed I wish that I could die,
But it is always helpful to sit and really cry,
I’m feeling sick and bloated, my IBS s bad
With all these horrid symptoms I think I may go mad.
Then my sister rings me to say she couldn’t see
The number on a house to which she’d visited for me,
The reason for this, we very soon found out,
I’d gone and turned all the figures completely round about.
Just a minute was that a ringing sound I hear ?
Oh yes, I’d forgotten it’s the ringing in my ear.
Now I start to really shake and jerk,
The fits and the tremors have come back that is a dead cert.
As I hobble down the garden to hang washing on the line,
My neighbour shouts, “How are you ?” and of course I say I’m fine.
For although people can be kind and very caring too,
We really have to accept it, they haven’t got a clue.
Every day I act as if I’m coping well and wear a mask ,
I always answer the same way, what ever question they may ask.
But if the truth were only known inside I want to shout and say
I’m feeling flipping awful almost the whole of every day.
I really am so thankful that your charity is out there,
Knowing that fellow sufferers will understand and care.
And just knowing this and I can reach you on the phone
I’m very sure helps all of us to know we’re not alone