Who Are You Gin?

That's a pretty deep question, but instead of getting all Confucius with it, I'll answer simply. I am a mother. I am a writer. I am a woman who was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia. After that I became a whiner, a mourner, a victim, a stereotype, a cynic, a hater. I lost my old life, my old hopes, my old dreams, my husband, my pride, my self esteem.

I gave up.

And then I was rescued by someone small of stature but big on wisdom. Only she doesn't exactly know it.

My four year old daughter came into my room one morning and crawled into bed with me. She sighed and asked me if I was hurting. Of course I was, but I smiled and tried to tell her that mama was okay. You can't lie to the young ones, they never buy it. Dramatically, she tossed herself down next to me and groaned. "Me too," she said.

Her too? UGH! I had officially hit rock bottom. Nothing else that had happened to me up until that point had made me feel more like a loser: Not losing my marriage, not losing my best friend, not even hating myself and the constant wallow sessions in self pity. This new developement brought with it a whole new set of symptoms. I'm not talking about pain, although there was plenty, or fatique. I'm talking about guilt and its many facets. Guilt about my daughter imitating my pain and making me synonymous with it. Guilt about the kind of role model I was for her. Guilt over the realization that I had become a painful blob of self pity making excuses for my behavior by hiding behind my symptoms.

Well, no more!

I got up that day and exercised. I felt it for the next week but I kept going. I popped 3 advil every four hours for months. (A very bad idea, but it was all I had available at the time. My stomach now suffers.) I started researching everything I could, good and bad, and I tried everything I could, from hokey holistic to scientific treatments.

Some things worked, others didn't.

If we ever know anything about Fibromyalgia its that we don't know anything about Fibromyalgia. There are no 100% cures. There are no 100% days. But there can be 98% days! I'm living proof of that. And while I'm feeling these 98% days I'm going to use them to find out why I have Fibromyalgia, what I can do to beat it, and what we can do to prove it exists and get the treatment we need.

I plan to find out all about Fibro. Is it a syndrom? A condition? A behavioral problem?

The only thing I DO know about it, is that regardless of why it started, its with me now. Say what you will about the condition, it isn't going to hurt my feelings half as much as ignoring what I'm feeling will cause me pain.

Starting in March, I am going to put myself through doctors, and tests, and vitamin regiments to ever increase my "good days". To get rid of the symptoms that keep me homebound on bad days and I'm taking YOU with me.