Ok, so it isn't the greatest day for some of us.  Actually, it came and went without much notice for me.  I spent the day as I do most days, not having a Valentine to give me candy, flowers or cards.  No biggie and I wasn't sent into a huge depression over it...it was just another day ending in my usual routine of watching CSI and Law and Order reruns alone.

It did; however, prompt this entry as I realized that one of the reasons that I don't have a supersonic love life is due to my fibromyalgia.  My X commented in one of our recent discussions about "what went wrong in our 20+ year marriage" about how he never understood until recently why I would cringe when he gave me the slightest touch.  Well, there ya go.  I had tried to explain to him on countless occasions why I did it but I guess it just didn't get through.  Some days I can't stand my clothes to touch me, much less anything else.  What people who don't have FM don't understand is that the first impulse upon any touch is PAIN.  It doesn't matter where or how - if I am touched the first thing I feel is PAIN.  Men, with their thick heads and massive egos cannot accept that, (at least the ones I know.)  All a man knows is that you are supposed to swoon at his every touch and it's not supposed to be from PAIN.  I can't help it.  It's just the way my body works. 

If you have FM, then you know what I am talking about.  If not, the easiest way to explain it is to imagine a person's body as being a sheet of bubble wrap.  Each little bubble full air is a nerve ending, attatched to a muscle.  For an individual with FM, all of your little bubbles are tight, filled with air until they are twitching and sore.  When pressure, ie a touch, is applied the first thing that happens is a reaction to the pressure or PAIN.  The pressure or touch causes the bubble to burst, releasing the air so that it is not stretched to the extreme, so for just a few moments there is actually a feeling of release, until the pressure builds up once again and the "bubble wrap" pockets, (nerves) are once again, stretched taught and again painful to the touch and twitching.

Imagine every muscle in your body being stretched and tensed all of the time and never releasing or relaxing.  That is what FM is.  That is why, if your spouse has FM, they react to your touch as if you have hurt them.  I know it has to be difficult to accept as a "pain" reaction rather than an "emotional" reaction.  It's not that FM sufferers do not want or need to be touched just like everyone else, it's that it causes us pain.  So Happy Late Valentine's Day all you fibro-foggers!  I hope yours was better and more meaningful than mine was.

If you know someone with Fibromyalgia, don't HUG them...

PRAY for them!

Keep up the good fight and never give up! - Tammy Elaine