Ironically, I discovered this lapse while searching for a post about my fibro mishegas that, as it turns out, I wrote and reposted for Fibromyalgia Awareness Day in 2011.
Three years ago. So much for time standing still in the presence of chronic pain and aggravation. Time and fibro have trudged on and on and on. Still, things have gotten (relatively) better over the decades; better being defined by me as reducing:
- pain levels by stripping gluten from my diet*
- brain fog by eliminating aspartame from my diet**
- sun-induced agitation by installing gray film on windows and staying indoors
- fluorescent lighting headaches by avoiding -- wait for it -- fluorescent lighting
By far my most effective fibro pain management technique? Denial.
That's right, I ignore all of the fibro-related crap until I am no longer ambulatory because deep fatigue and/or pain force me to get horizontal. In a dark room. With earplugs. Also sometimes with the cat as my nap companion. Nuts? Perhaps. Even so, after 28 years this approach seems to work well-ish enough for me.
And relying on denial does occasionally provide a hearty rueful laugh. Like the laugh I snorted out upon realizing I'd blanked out on Fibromyalgia Awareness Day 2014 because I was flattened and fogged by fibro. Or perhaps I was, in fact, "fully living into" fibromyalgia awareness.
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| Nap Companion, Mozart |
* "Clinical impact of a gluten-free diet..." BMC Gastroenterology
**I doubt I will ever stop grieving the loss of Diet Coke.
