New here with unanswered questions.

[lisajjm70]

(Sorry, I wasn't aware that newcomers were to post here first.) Hi, everyone. I don't have a *diagnosis* yet, but my GP has been ruling out other conditions. Several months ago, I started having new pain. I have osteoarthritis and I went to the doctor, assuming it was just getting worse. When I told him what I'd been noticing, he frowned and said, "Hmm. I think we should check some other things and see if perhaps you have fibromyalgia." Well, knock me over...that hadn't ONCE occurred me!
Onto to the answers I'm unsure of:
I have pain in my joints daily, and at times, I have pain that's more muscular and widespread....much like it feels when you have the flu. Does that sound familiar? I haven't been able to find consistent answers as to where people with fibro normally have pain. I do have areas that are tender to touch, but I'm not sure where, specifically, it most often presents with this condition. Is it only in the joints or elsewhere? I'd appreciate any responses or insight.
I'm sorry anyone needs to be here, but I'm glad there is support for those who do.

 

[JayCS]

Ah, now I've already welcomed you! And answered your questions as well as I could...
No rules where you start posting here, and your first place actually was perfectly fitting, because you aren't just saying hello, like some people, but have already jumped into questions, which is great!

 

[lisajjm70]

@JayCS: Thank you! I appreciate that. Your answers were helpful, yes. I suppose it's like any other condition, in that it can vary to some degree from person-to-person, yes? I'm not sure what's left to rule out, but I have an appointment tomorrow, so we'll see. I could be wrong, but not knowing seems to make it all harder.

 

[sunkacola]

@JayCS: Thank you! I appreciate that. Your answers were helpful, yes. I suppose it's like any other condition, in that it can vary to some degree from person-to-person, yes? I'm not sure what's left to rule out, but I have an appointment tomorrow, so we'll see. I could be wrong, but not knowing seems to make it all harder.

Fibromyalgia varies greatly from person to person in it's degree, frequency of flares, and in the places in the body where the pain occurs. The one thing that is common in all people with fibro is that the pain is bilateral....occurring on both sides of the body, and is widespread. It may or may not also be accompanied by what is referred to as "brain fog" of varying degrees of severity, andusually is accompanied by fatigue. I think the fatigue is almost always present because if a person is in constant pain it simply drains the body of energy just to deal with that.

There are many other conditions and syndromes that have similar symptoms, so it's important to rule them all out. A complete list of all of them can be found just by looking it up online.

 

[lisajjm70]

Ok, thank you! I have terrible brain fog, but I didn't know until recently that fibro could cause that. The same thing with fatigue. I've had some difficulty with that for many years now, but that was attributed to two separate brain tumor resections. "This" fatigue feels quite different, as in more intense. I could fall asleep sitting up and it was never like that until this all started.

 

[JayCS]

I suppose it's like any other condition, in that it can vary to some degree from person-to-person, yes?

Actually, it varies much more in fibro than in other conditions, because it's not yet possible to define it or subgroups of it, not possible to "prove" it, or "find" anything definite in bloods or scans. There are at least 15-20 biomarkers, but they're only things that have a certain possibility to be present, not a probability. (One entrepreneur even claim that some of them - cytokines and chemokines - are a legitimate "test".)
The ACR criteria for instance are not based on any perfect or ideal "picture", they have been changed from 1990 over 2010/11 to 2016 to "catch" all relevant people, as a pragmatic approximation.

common in all people with fibro is that the pain is bilateral

Except a few exceptions to the rule, some say, and then more right-sided than left, apparently (gallbladder, Eric Berg believes).
More comprehensible for the overall pain, but weird that even many local pains, e.g. around joints, hurt on both sides, altho there is no arthritis etc.

I think the fatigue is almost always present because if a person is in constant pain it simply drains the body of energy just to deal with that.

I do think so, too, and pain would contribute to most of the ("17") types of fatigue I've attempted to distinguish.

However even without an ME/CFS diagnosis, the levels of most of my fatigue types are much higher than and also fairly independent of my pain levels. And now I've got local pains under control and usually pace very well the exhaustibility is still debilitating. My "fatigue" is always a 7 on best days, 9 or above on worst, whilst my pain is 1 in best hours, usually 2, and I only allow it up to 5 if I know it'll go down to 3 inside of an hour (or three for something special). So it's common for me to have a pain of 1 but a "fatigue" of 9. Whilst my fog type of mental fatigue is usually 1, completely independently of pain, (and the depressiveness type (usually 1) may be more a result of pain, but actually more from other symptoms.

I'd even venture to turn the causality around for me: it's the exhaustibility of my muscle cells that leads to pain.

I'd be interested in how you all experience that, same or different, and what you think that depends on.