Fibromyalgia in remission

So it appears my fibromyalgia is in remission and has been for over 2 years now! Oh happy day so with all this extra love I have from not being in insane pain every waking and sleeping minute of the day I would like to help others find ways to escape this horrible condition.

Also by escape I mean confront head on. Yea doesn't sound fun but it's the most effective way. So after going for test after test after test to discover what's going wrong in your body and being put back to square one with a much lighter wallet you most likely have been told that nothing appears to be wrong and life style changes are needed. Your Dr may have a series of things for you to try out, different medications, massage therapies, physical therapy. Yes there are many treatment options and I've tried a lot of them but now I'm going to share with you exactly what worked.

*My first important step was the purchase of a wii fit and playing the balance games and doing the yoga exercises. This really helped me connect with my body and listen to it in a way I'd never done before.  It also introduced me to yoga.

*Meditation this was probably the most important thing I did for myself. I don't have a set meditation I do or particular practice I do every day but rather when I feel very anxious or have some serious pain I sit, I breathe deeply 3 times and then ask myself where is this coming from? What am I feeling or noticing? What are my senses telling me? If I can find the emotion or situation that's stirred up these sensations and just allow myself to recognise and experience those feelings and let them go often the pain dissolves immediately.

*Go to a yoga class! this really saved me and got me functioning again.  The more yoga I did the more I learnt to recognise exactly where my pain was and when I was tensing. This was incredible because it took me from having an overall bruised tenderness to sensitivity to specific places similar to pain at an injection site. But really it was teaching me to be present, aware and give me a dialogue with my body and breath.

*So after doing Hatha yoga for 2 months I felt sooo much better but the pain always came back and I wasn't satisfied with the result of only having half a week of reduced pain.  This is when my yoga teacher suggested Kundalini yoga she said "give it a try I think it may be just your ticket, it will rebalance your nerves and detoxify your system and do so many things for you." So off I went and after 2 months of it and getting over how strange it was I realised I didn't have tenderness. I had specific aches that would come and go noticeably headaches,  back pain, shoulder and neck pain, leg pain and foot pain. But these weren't an everyday thing more like a my legs hurt at the moment but everything else is fine for a few weeks then my legs would come good and i'd get a headache. Much better than everything all at once!

*The next thing I really had to take responsibility for was following my gut. After doing yoga and meditation for a while I became increasingly aware of a sensation like a clang in the pit of my stomach as if someone had struck a very loud gong or scraped finger nails against a blackboard. Bad things always happened after that sensation. As I noticed it more I realised it always happened when a decision came up or when I was thinking about doing something and noticed I could decide to do something else and change my mind about my course of action to avoid that bad feeling. Which ultimately made my life a lot less complicated, eliminated so much stress and things just seemed to work better.

*Gut feeling was the first step towards letting my body help me and starting to love it again rather than feel prisoner to it. I started seeing energy healers to help with my body and stuff in my life that felt stuck. Anyone that could intuitively bring to my attention repressed emotions, situations, arguments that I had held onto. I guess it was kinda a super fast tracked form of counselling because they were able to make me remember things I had long forgotten that i'd been angry about or had deeply hurt me. They would talk me through my thoughts and feelings about these memories and help me find more helpful ways to view the situation and better ways to react to similar stimuli in the future. I'd come out of those sessions having substantially less pain,  feeling 10 tonnes lighter and super relaxed.

*The next thing I really had to look into was making sure I did things I wanted to do! I have a habit of collecting hobbies but giving up on them when I find out i'm not the best at it after putting in my best effort to conquer it. However some things have stuck that i'm pretty good at. One is sewing and boy do I feel amazing after i've imagined, sketched, cut out then stitched together a gift or gift for myself and brought something imaged into reality. But often I felt like I just didn't have the energy to tackle a project so I made myself a list of things that gave me a boost. Easy things was maintaining my appearance. Simply painting my toenails or getting dressed up to have dinner with a friend made a big difference in my mood. So I always have a little list of things that pick me up to rely on when I was exhausted and down in the dumps. Maybe it could be a favourite movie to watch in bed with your favourite ice cream, or a playlist of songs that has a good rhythm and gets you dancing in your pajamas (No one has to know). Or a really simple thing like a cup of tea.

Right now I am almost 3 years into my new yoga life and have had 2 years of no widespread tender points and for the past year I have worked over 50 hours most weeks. I was getting a weekly massage to help me keep up with my busy business schedule and made sure I kept exploring my emotions and talking them out and finding new ways to break outdated mental patterns but my existence is not a constant physical battle anymore. I have won my war and while I'm not 100% pain free who is this day and age?

It's a daily responsibility for myself but it's one i'm happy to apply myself to as I don't classify as having diagnosable fibromyalgia anymore! I'm free and I did it on my own steam out of sheer force of will with the help of some wonderful people showing me the way and being great friends. I wish every one luck on their journey to health and happiness whether you believe you deserve it or not.

I conquered my fibromyalgia and so can you!