Lesson 8 is a lesson I have yet to learn or realise. I am hoping that it comes to me as I am writing. That is how I learn a lot about what is really going on inside me; I write. I don’t plan my blog posts or if I have an idea of what I want to write about, that’s enough to work with. I find that if I plan writing too much, it becomes more difficult. It flows less and doesn’t ‘sound’ like it’s me or my inner voice speaking. Impromptu writing however,can be very effective at times in helping me to realise, remember or learn new things 

Part of the reason I haven’t blogged in quite a while is that I just couldn’t find the time. Most of my free time these days I’m confined to the house because of fatigue and, more recently, pain. I had pneumonia over Christmas; it took 2 different courses of antibiotics to get rid of the “consolidation” in my right lung. Funnily enough, I had started with this awful sharp pain in my back/shoulder/chest in November. My chest sounded clear on all 3 of the appointments I had been to. The first GP concluded it was muscular/soft tissue related (fibro), and sent me away with a tube of Ibuprofen cream. As that didn’t work, I then went back and saw a different GP. It was my ‘regular’ GP as it happens. She knows me well and is aware of all my health problems. She listened to my chest (sounded clear again), and agreed with the first GP that it was most likely fibro pain. Some time after the problem first began, as it was also getting worse, I went back. This time, another different GP. My intention was to ask them to increase my painkillers temporarily until this ‘flare’ eased off. I explained the pain (again) and she listened to my chest (sounded clear). She decided that as it was ongoing like this, it would make sense to double-check it wasn’t chest infection with an xray. She thought the pain sounded like pleurisy. 

Guess what? I was right… BOOM!!! Finally somebody had looked past the fibro and looked more at other potential options. My persistence had paid off and I felt like telling them “I told you so, I knew it wasn’t fibro”. I know that it’s easy to blame ongoing aches and pains on fibro or any other chronic problem a person might have. But sometimes it would be nice if I was listened to, heard, and taken seriously the first time I asked; not the third time. 

Anyhow, having such a bad infection absolutely floored me. To the point that I am still recovering from a fatigue point of view. I still get the pleuritic pain, but I am told it can last a while after an infection. Apart from that pain, my fibro had been pretty steady and manageable. Until recently.

I am still trying to work out what has changed for the pain to suddenly have become so agonising in recent weeks. Literally everything hurts. Joints, skin, muscles. The intensity of the pain has just rocketed from ‘hardly anything’ to ‘wtf is happening?’. I have spent time writhing around the bed in agony. It hurts so much I can’t keep myself still. But moving around is also causing pain. And I end up curled up on the bed rocking; because that is the only other thing I can do. As I am crying because I am scared, and tired, and paranoid. Most (not all) professionals will see my fibro diagnosis and presume, if basic bloods are normal, that it’s fibro. Nothing to worry about in their eyes. I don’t feel that way; I feel that if the pain is that severe, then it is something to worry about. 

And there we have it; a title for this blog post and Lesson 8: have more faith in your intuitive feelings.

Just because a GP says this agony is ‘just the fibro’, it doesn’t make it factual. That is their opinion. Opinions are subjective. My opinion is just as important as anyone elses. If something doesn’t feel right, it is probably your intuition trying to tell you! Trust your instinct, judgments, body and mind. 

❤❤❤