My house is disgusting. I think I have mentioned in the past how quickly a home goes down the drain when the leading lady of the home is down and out with a fibro flare. While I consider myself in recovery mode, I had a minor setback this past week.
I have been making some extra money lately working at various clinics. This Tuesday I had the privilege to train in an area that you have to wear a lead apron the entire time that you are at work. I don't know if you have ever wore a lead apron, whether for a procedure or a dental x-rays, but they are HEAVY! I wore a full body armor type for 7 hours! Wearing an extra 20lbs for that amount of time put my body in full revolt. I was in excruciating pain by bedtime. To make matters worse, it rained. While I love sleeping during a rainy day, my body doesn't exert gross amounts of energy on rainy days. I worked at another location the next day and had to worry about how my pain levels would be while I was there. I have been off the past 2 days and have been nothing but exhausted.
That brings me to my point. The past two days I have attempted to run errands and clean. Every evening at bedtime I tell myself that it is going to be a great day to clean. Each day I wake up to my body saying, "Yeah, I don't think that is a great idea." It just doesn't want to wake up. Each errand or cleaning activity wears me out to the point that I just want to crawl in bed and never get out. Today it is raining and it has been a drudgery to push through and keep going. My house is nowhere near what I would call organized and cleaned. It is lived in and functional. That is the life of the fibromyalgia sufferer/survivor and that is ok.
I constantly apologize for the condition of my home to my family or friends. Many of them have immaculate homes and you can walk in at any time and it is in pristine condition. Mine will never be that way and that is ok. I don't think that my kids will look back on life and think, "I wish Mom would have cleaned our house more." I think they will remember that we had fun and that we had family time and that they were loved. That, in the end, is what matters. So if you are having a bad cleaning week or are down and out for a bit, remember, it is ok to take the time you need to heal. Believe me, if your house is like my house, it will ALL still be there when you get better. Hang in there fibro friends!
Friday, July 26, 2013
Wednesday, July 3, 2013
The problem with running is....
Since my recovery process is in full force now, I feel that it is time to resume some sort of running regimen like I had before. My friend Emily from work was talking about running a 5k and how the people that have offered to run with her are either doing Iron Man contests or have barely ran a day in their life and are just going to walk the entire time. Her conversation led to me offering to run it with her since I was about the same running level as her.
So the running process started last Friday, starting with a short jaunt around the neighborhood (right at a mile). I didn't want to do my old route (2.5 miles) for fear it would be too much. I worked the weekend as usual and then resumed to full running route last night (Tuesday). I am SO out of shape. I used to be able to run a mile straight through and now I'm huffing and puffing feeling like I will die. My body also takes longer to recover than it used to. I think that is just normal though.
Normal...such a hard word for someone for Fibromyalgia to deal with. Since nobody knows what causes this disease there really is no cure, therefore you have to study your own body to know what sets off your symptoms. Its hard to decipher between what is normal body aches and pains after a workout and normal fibromyalgia symptoms. People already think that we are hypochondriacs, and some of us are, or at least have those tendencies, and then we actually try to heal ourselves and we hurt, not knowing which pain is from a disease or from our bodies trying to heal. It's a very confusing process and (God forbid) that we talk about our muscle hurting after a run. We already talk about our pain as it is. I have had Fibromyalgia half of my life now and it is hard to remember what my original normal was...LOL! So a healing process is a hard process.
So here is what I propose to do. I refuse to focus on the pain. I will now focus on my body getting healthy again. I will work hard to put my body to the test and study what makes me hurt. If I push too hard, I have learned something about my health and what I can do. If I push myself and don't hurt so bad, I have found a limit that I can handle and work to eventually master and try to push past it as well. Fibromyalgia is NOT a reason to not exercise and eat right. It is an excellent reason to exercise and eat right. I see so many people with Fibromyalgia use it as their excuse to stay in bed all day. And while sometimes that is definitely needed, I see people who milk that excuse and refuse to push to regain their health. They give up.
Don't give up on yourself! This life is too amazing to miss out on. If you don't like something about yourself, change it, or work really hard to make it better. Surround yourself with positive people and ditch the ones that constantly bring you down. And for Pete's sake, get outside and walk, run, enjoy the outdoors. God made this earth a beautiful place. He made our bodies resilient beings that can heal themselves from the inside out. Start working on your life if you don't like it and make it the best one. My goals when I am on my death bed is to look back from this day on and say, "I don't regret a thing. I lived my life to its fullest!" And I will accomplish that goal!
Have a great day fibro friends! God bless!
So the running process started last Friday, starting with a short jaunt around the neighborhood (right at a mile). I didn't want to do my old route (2.5 miles) for fear it would be too much. I worked the weekend as usual and then resumed to full running route last night (Tuesday). I am SO out of shape. I used to be able to run a mile straight through and now I'm huffing and puffing feeling like I will die. My body also takes longer to recover than it used to. I think that is just normal though.
Normal...such a hard word for someone for Fibromyalgia to deal with. Since nobody knows what causes this disease there really is no cure, therefore you have to study your own body to know what sets off your symptoms. Its hard to decipher between what is normal body aches and pains after a workout and normal fibromyalgia symptoms. People already think that we are hypochondriacs, and some of us are, or at least have those tendencies, and then we actually try to heal ourselves and we hurt, not knowing which pain is from a disease or from our bodies trying to heal. It's a very confusing process and (God forbid) that we talk about our muscle hurting after a run. We already talk about our pain as it is. I have had Fibromyalgia half of my life now and it is hard to remember what my original normal was...LOL! So a healing process is a hard process.
So here is what I propose to do. I refuse to focus on the pain. I will now focus on my body getting healthy again. I will work hard to put my body to the test and study what makes me hurt. If I push too hard, I have learned something about my health and what I can do. If I push myself and don't hurt so bad, I have found a limit that I can handle and work to eventually master and try to push past it as well. Fibromyalgia is NOT a reason to not exercise and eat right. It is an excellent reason to exercise and eat right. I see so many people with Fibromyalgia use it as their excuse to stay in bed all day. And while sometimes that is definitely needed, I see people who milk that excuse and refuse to push to regain their health. They give up.
Don't give up on yourself! This life is too amazing to miss out on. If you don't like something about yourself, change it, or work really hard to make it better. Surround yourself with positive people and ditch the ones that constantly bring you down. And for Pete's sake, get outside and walk, run, enjoy the outdoors. God made this earth a beautiful place. He made our bodies resilient beings that can heal themselves from the inside out. Start working on your life if you don't like it and make it the best one. My goals when I am on my death bed is to look back from this day on and say, "I don't regret a thing. I lived my life to its fullest!" And I will accomplish that goal!
Have a great day fibro friends! God bless!
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