When Personalities Conflict With Illness

My personality and my illnesses do NOT work well together at all. I like to be busy, with some rest time of course. I like to be challenged at whatever I do. At work I continually take on more and more wherever I can, although my pay doesn't compensate me nearly enough to do so. I do it anyways because I get bored without a constant challenge. I always want to learn how to do more, more, more. I always try to find the fastest, most efficient ways to complete everything. I would say that has become a talent of mine after developing fibromyalgia. Making big tasks smaller and more manageable I suppose. We all have to learn it to make our lives a little bit easier. If we can make every single task a little easier, a little faster, and a little more efficient, then we are saving ourselves tons of time and energy in the long term, or at least I like to think so. That is what I keep telling myself.

In all reality though, living with a chronic illness that no one else sees can be devastatingly difficult. There are only so many ways to attempt to make our lives easier. I can only find the fastest, most efficient way to do the dishes, but I cannot make them do themselves. I can find the easiest ways to complete my job, but that job still needs to be completed. When you have fibromyalgia or any other chronic illness, everything seems more difficult than it used to. Walking up and down the stairs in my house is quite honestly so difficult for me that I dread having to go downstairs to do laundry or whatnot when I am not feeling up to it. It doesn't mean that I cannot physically go down the stairs because I sure as hell can, but the amount of energy that it uses simply isn't worth it to me. It is amazing how one flight of stairs can make me feel like I just ran the Boston Marathon. I get dizzy, nauseous, extremely fatigued, and my legs feel like Jello afterwards. It is literally exhausting to use the stairs for me, yet every time I visit the doctor or any other place that has an elevator, I still choose to use the stairs because I am just that stubborn.

I can't avoid the stairs for all eternity, although I wish I could. I take the stairs for the conditioning I suppose, or just to prove to myself that I can. Every time I regret it because I am worn the heck out afterwards. How embarrassing is that? Most people would think "Wow, you must be really unfit." There are some days after work that I pull into my garage and just sit in my car because I just cannot find the energy to get out of my car and go inside. Sometimes I just cannot find the energy to even speak to people. People might find me to be rude or anti-social, but in all reality, people just take a ton of energy. Even just having a conversation is so tiring that I feel like I might pass out from exhaustion. This really doesn't bode well for my social life. People think I am mad at them, or they get mad at me for not keeping in touch, but I simply do not have enough energy to maintain healthy friendships. I have lost a lot of friends over the years for not being able to keep up with them. Sure, I have canceled plans may of times, not because I wanted to but because I had to.

Good friends are hard to find, and good friends that understand your limitations are much more difficult to come by. I kind of wish I had a friend that also shared my condition so that we could cancel plans on each other whenever we wanted and not feel guilty about it or at least know they understand. Imagine a friend that would not hold you up to every plan that you made with them, and understood that when you are having a bad day that it had nothing to do with them, that it was just a bad day. They wouldn't require that you chatted with them the whole time, and you could just sit in silence with them and be alright. They would know that "maybe you should exercise more", or "just be positive and it will go away" are not the things we want to hear. Imagine that friend. I want that friend, and I need that friend. No body that does not live with fibromyalgia can possibly even begin to understand the depths that the pain reaches. It reaches all parts of you; your entire body, your heart, your mind, and your soul. They are all in pain. Every aspect of me is in pain. I need someone who understands that as well as I do.

In the meantime, I pour my thoughts onto this blog, allowing it to relieve a fraction of the pain. Not only do I write to help myself, but I do hope that someone, somewhere feels they can relate to my pain. I do hope to help people with fibromyalgia and chronic pain whether it be just rambling on about things they can relate to, or being that friend that everyone with chronic pain needs. I find the community that is involved in fibromyalgia, chronic pain, and chronic fatigue to be quite inspiring and I love reading other people's stories. If anything, I hope there is one person out there that my ramblings have helped.

Until next time,

-Aimee