Fibromyalgia

Post your questions about pain management for our experts here.

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dstill1964
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Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2012 12:21 pm
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by dstill1964 on Thu Oct 08, 2020 7:13 am

Fibromyalgia

I am having terrible Fibromyalgia pains that are debilitating and restricting my life. I take tramadol and Pregabalin and sometimes Paracetamol if it’s too bad. It gets exacerbated by stress and have an overload of that in my life currently. I need to function due to a chronically ill Daughter and Son with MH issues. What else can I do please?

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Arthritis Action
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Joined: Wed Sep 28, 2016 1:27 pm
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by Arthritis Action on Wed Oct 14, 2020 2:49 pm

Re: Fibromyalgia

Fibromyalgia is a problem of the brain delivering too many pain messages to your body even though nothing is wrong where it hurts. Medicines don't help much as you have discovered because the problem is in the brain rather than with tissue damage. Poor sleep due to current or past stresses is often the trigger for an overactive brain and you probably also experience fatigue and thinking problems or brain fog. Most hospitals have fibromyalgia programmes to learn self-management strategies as medicines don't work. The vital strategies are improving sleep, learning effective pacing, gentle exercise (starting at a very low level) and dealing with your mind or mood with talking therapies, relaxation, distraction and finding time for yourself. Learning to say no is also vital as is accepting help from others. See what resources are available in your area and if you still have pain, reduce your medication as it's not working.

Dr Wendy Holden
Consultant Rheumatologist and Medical Advisor to Arthritis Action
https://www.arthritisaction.org.uk/
020 3781 7120

Codetalk
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Joined: Mon May 25, 2020 5:05 pm
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by Codetalk on Thu Oct 15, 2020 2:29 pm

Re: Fibromyalgia

In addition to the previous response, I would like to suggest becoming familiar with how a psychological approach combined with mindfulness can help you to manage your pain. The two combined provide a greater understanding and awareness of your pain, such as becoming familiar with your own biopsychosocial make up, how pain memory is activated and the role of metacognition (awareness of your thinking), and how the practices of mindfulness meditation help you to soften your response to your pain. The body scan practice (I refer to it as the body focus practice) is a particularly useful one with pain, but also the mindset of mindfulness does help you to recognise aspects of life that are worth considering.

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Tracy Corbett
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by Tracy Corbett on Thu Oct 29, 2020 3:30 pm

Re: Fibromyalgia

Hello.
Patients with fibromyalgia can really benefit from a multi-modal approach including pain relief medicines, education on your condition, exercise, cognitive behavioural approaches, pacing and goal-setting. Pacing is very important for patients suffering with fibromyalgia: it is important to identify your baseline activity levels (this means the amount of activity you can cope with which does not cause a flare up) so that you can identify a suitable level of exercise for you. In general terms, bodies/joints like movement and exercise is usually pain-relieving. But it's important to avoid the "boom or bust" cycle which can happen when you try to be too active, suffer a flare up, rest for a few weeks, then try again. If you can avoid the "highs and the lows", you can very gently incrementally improve your exercise tolerance and this is helpful both for pain relief and physical strength/fitness, as well as your mental health which can be an issue for patients with a long-term painful chronic diagnosis.

Consulting your GP to ask for a referral to a suitably experienced physiotherapist/osteopath would be highly recommended as part of your pain-management arsenal.
Tracy Corbett
Chartered Physiotherapist

http://www.talkhealthpartnership.com/on ... orbett.php

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