enhanced somatosensory perception - only pain?

[candan]

Do you also have increased sensitivity to other physical sensations besides pain (e.g., itchiness)? I am wondering if it's another phenomenon that suggests fibromyalgia falls within the autoimmune disorder realm.

 

[johnsalmon]

I don't believe that Fibro is an autoimmune disease - I was put on tablets that lower my autoimmune system which did affect my Hashimoto’s disease (which is a autoimmune disorder) effects but made no difference to my fibro effects. I believe it is a problem with the CNS

 

[JayCS]

Hi candan, and welcome!

Do you also have increased sensitivity to other physical sensations besides pain (e.g., itchiness)?

I am wondering if it's another phenomenon that suggests fibromyalgia falls within the autoimmune disorder realm.

I believe it is a problem with the CNS

Actually, increased sensitivity to other physical sensations if they did all come from the same cause would suggest it being part of a central sensitisation, it's a core of the hypothesis that that's at the root of fibromyalgia, whether central nervous system (CNS) oder peripheral or both. More than it being autoimmune.

However there are too many open questions not only in these two hypotheses and the others too, but also in our perception of something as increased sensitivity. Whilst it seems that some people's sensitivity to pain may be increased (hyperalgesia, allodynia), mine and others (who do not have this but rather high pain tolerance and threshold) still seem to have a higher amount of pain, which would then not be a matter of perception. So I believe there actually is a lot more wrong and actually "injured" and askew than "autoimmune" or "the nervous system", just that it hasn't been found yet and thus can't be measured.

Additionally, seeming sensitivity to other physical sensations like itchiness could well be something else and fairly independent of pain sensations. (Me: My itchiness all over from water, soaps, non-cotton clothes and more is much more likely something like sicca (dryness) syndrome and a mast cell issue, my MCAS and I can stop it by avoiding contact with those triggers which are very different to my fibro triggers. My MCAS and my fibro may be somehow connected, so some treatments are the same (like GABA to increase serotonin and decrease histamine), but 80% of symptoms and triggers are completely different.)

Itchy skin and/or eyes may be dry and then may be Sjögren's, which is autoimmune. But that'd be a co-morbidity. Albeit with a whole row of similar symptoms. So as a chief rheum once said to me: It doesn't really make a difference if I have it or not, I still have to find something for each symptom singly.

So I'm wondering if your other sensations actually started at the same time as your fibro pain and can be influenced in the same way. If they did, then as opposed to mine I'd say yours might have a similar cause (like your nervous system) and you might find something that influences both (like TENS or microcurrents and vagus/vagal nerve exercises).

Praps itchiness isn't the best example for what you are asking....? Of the 14 groups on my comprehensive symptoms list, apart from #9 gut sensitivity, #8 various types of sensitivity are fairly often associated with fibro - #8 means I guess "roughly in the middle". There I've listed:
Alcohol, Allodynia (hypersensitive to touch), Chemicals in cleaning products, perfumes, etc., Cold, Foods, Heat, Light sensitivity = photophobia, Noise intolerance, Odors = smells, Sensory overload, Pressure & humidity changes, Sun, Temperature changes, Weather changes and Wind.
Most characteristic for fibro as opposed to autoimmune, mast cell or other conditions I'd say is that in us it most likely and commonly causes us pain (or aching or fatigue or insomnia). As opposed for instance to itching or hives/rashes etc. That doesn't mean it can ever be different to pain for someone with fibro, but that would be the most common type of symptom.
A more common symptom group than intolerances is the #5 the neurological one, which again points more to the CSS hypothesis, rather than the autoimmune one. Itchiness can be a nerve problem, too, I had that decades ago where itchiness all over was caused by my water intolerance plus my back pain making my skin nerves trigger a kind of painful itchiness.

Altogether I wouldn't want to exclude an autoimmune component in either your itchiness nor the autoimmune cause of fibro hypothesis, esp. as no one knows anything really, but from all this background I doubt it's a major component.