The internet, oh the lovely internet.

Being new to Fibro and having all information relating to Fibro at the tips of my fingers is not a good thing, me thinks. As I said in the blog yesterday, I don’t know whether to curse it or praise it. The praise is the easy part. With the internet I have access to others that have this condition so I don’t feel alone in it. The internet allows me to research to my heart’s content about all problems and possible solutions to Fibro. This is where it gets murky.

On the Sunday after my failed attempt with Lyrica, I took to the internet like a hound. I wanted to know if the reaction was normal (I called the pharmacist, but needed more info). I wanted to know if that was all there was for me to do and I was doomed because of the sensitivity to this drug. I wanted to know if there was a way to control this without drugs. And, this keeps my doctor from answering 100 calls a day as I remember new questions that I have on this condition (I am sure he is thrilled).

I came upon a discussion board of Fibro sufferers. I found it comforting, informational and terrifying. As I was reading there were a few reoccurring themes in the posts. Some of them being; pain (unrelenting pain), depression, disability, and most of them had other syndromes or conditions in addition to Fibro. Don’t get me wrong, there were quite a few posts that were hopeful, cheerful and upbeat. I just didn’t focus on those. This scared me. This depressed me. This caused me to focus more on the pain, pain that I had been able to basically ignore for years. Which made me mad. It is a bad cycle.

I posted something on this discussion board speaking of my terror over having this. And one of the very wise moderators told me that I was reading too much into it. That the people that are on the boards are in pain and having a “flare up”. And when a person is having a “flare up” they won’t write anything but bad, sad and depressing things (I am not quoting, just writing what I got out of it). If someone is feeling well they are out and about enjoying life, not focusing on the discussion board. This made me feel marginally better.

But, still, I don’t want to be in pain forever. I don’t want this to morph into some other condition. I don’t want to be so bad off that I have to quit working. At this point, I have become addicted to finding out information. I check the discussion board about 100 times a day to see if there is something new. I type “Fibromyalgia” into Google just about as often. Alas, there is nothing new. No magical cure, no death by Fibromyalgia, no ground breaking discovering on how to live with this. It is the same. And so am I. I think that this may be the first step in dealing with it. And, I am happy for it.