Trauma as the Origination of Fibromyalgia

    As a friend told me once, things happen to you but your response is greater than what happened. My family was not prepared for trauma. Usually when people experience major life problems they see the help of a family friend who may encourage them to seek professional help. Up until the past ten or so years, seeking out the help of a therapist was frowned upon. My grandmother frowned upon shrinks and passed it down to her children and so forth. Psychology was a relatively new field in their day and neuroscience has come a long way since then. You were considered weak if you sought out help outside the family.

    As I am lying in bed at 3 AM, as I often do in my sleep cycle, I thought about where the origination point of trauma and symptoms occurred. My family was in a major car accident around Christmas when I was fifteen. We were lucky to walk away from it. Two months later, my fingers turned white during Winterguard practice in the gymnasium and the pain was excruciating; the first sign of Raynaud’s syndrome. I would get bronchitis infections like clockwork after that.

    My first year of college, when I was eighteen, I contracted infectious mononucleiosis. After recovering from mono, I noticed that my energy levels were dropping rapidly. Two years later, I was in a car accident with my brother. Despite the fact that I was wearing a seat belt, my sternum hit the steering column and the wind was knocked out of me. I couldn’t catch my breath. It was soon after that accident that my thyroid went out of whack and I couldn’t get a better diagnosis than thyroiditis. When I was put on Synthroid, the next test showed that I was hyperthyroid which seemed accurate because I dropped eight pounds and had heart palpitations. I stopped the med because I knew at that point, the doctors had no idea what they were doing and I would rather suffer and do my own research until science caught up with the medical field. I wasn’t sleeping well. I was angry all the time and I had no coping skills to deal with the emotional trauma and the physical response that took place.

    Soon after, I would start seeing my first therapist and read the classic self-help book, Feeling Good. It was not a bad starting point. Had some good ideas but it was far too thick for reading. I was doing things it suggested like to journal whatever I did that was productive and rating how I felt after doing them. The original book about “adulting” I guess you would say. The majority of the problem for me mentally at that time was to kick that flight response into overdrive rather than deal with the problem because it felt like doing anything good caused a lot of pain or took a lot of energy out of me.

However, feeling better still did not explain the energy drain I was experiencing. Nor did it explain the increased sensitivity of my back along the spinal column or the recent Restless Leg Syndrome diagnosis. Then there were the increased sensitivities to food; particularly any item that contained high amounts of preservatives or other additives. And if I went to the gym, I felt far worse than never going at all. I’ve joined Weight Watchers for months and only lost five pounds.

    Things didn’t really start changing until I registered for formal Tai Chi classes at Virginia Western Community College. It felt like slow motion dancing. I took ballet classes when I was a kid. I have taken hula at the YMCA. I’ve taught people how to dive and exercise in water without hurting. Volleyball requires a lot of effort but I feel rejuvenated after playing a few games. I hate aerobics, walking, and running but I love tennis and the 30 minute workout at Planet Fitness. I like weightlifting twice a week and have surprised my health teacher at Roanoke College with my strength. I thank my lucky stars every day that I am built solid but cushioned by squish zones or fat pockets.

    What I am trying to say is that resolving trauma is a journey and you have to be in it for the long haul. You have to forgive yourself and others when you don’t understand your body and mind or receive sympathy for how you feel. You have to be patient. Far more patient than you ever could before you begin to see results. You have to learn, progress, and change everything that you are doing right now in order to recover.

   

You must stop eating pre-packaged foods. You must journal everything. And you absolutely have to keep moving no matter how bad you feel. Can’t lift weights? Don’t. Get in the pool. Afraid of water? Learn Tai Chi. There is no reason why you can’t move. A body at rest tends to stay at rest whereas a body in motion will stay in motion until an outside force acts upon it. Don’t let excuses act upon it.*

*However, there are very viable medical reasons why one cannot exercise. Speak to your doctor about movement alternatives.