Saturday, April 23, 2011

How Can I Minimize Stress When...

...I don't have a job I can do. I may have a job I am quickly becoming unable to do, a job on the verge of extinction or a job that I have already lost. But I do not have a viable way to support myself and my dependents, so how do I minimize stress with no income?

...I don't have access to the type of health care that understands Fibromyalgia and how to manage it. I am locked in a HMO, Medicare or Medicade, or simply have no or very restricted insurance since I lost my job. I don't have the luxury of shopping around and looking for doctors I can get to believe me. I am treated like a psychologically imbalanced nut job when the reality is it's a neurologically imbalanced illness but no one is paying attention, so how am I supposed  minimize stress without access to adequate health care to manage my symptoms?

...My relationships in life are falling apart. I am hardly intimate with my spouse or partner anymore because I hurt all the time. My children resent not having a healthy mom or dad to do all the things their friends parents do for them. My friends and family put pressure on me to get over this so we can get back to living our life as normal again. So how am I supposed to minimize stress when family and friends won't accept my limitations?

...Guilt is radiating from my body. I am so pitifully sad and angry because I am so dependent on others for basic things in life. And I can't return the favor because I am an empty bottomless well of need with nothing to give. I project these feelings into anger at many of those around me, and depression towards myself. I am so hopeless and confused and lashing out. So how am I supposed to minimize stress when I have the most relentless cord of anger whipping out at all around me?

...I am skipping along the yellow brick road one day and out of nowhere a debilitating chronic pain condition knocks me down, throws me around a little and spits me out a bruised, battered and beaten shadow of my former self. So how am I supposed to minimize stress when the rug of my life has been yanked out from underneath me?

...The frustration of Social Security is astounding. They refuse to believe that I cannot work. Appeal after appeal, month after month with no cash coming in. So how how am I supposed to minimize stress with no guarantee of shelter or food for the future?

...It has been so long since I earned a decent wage that I now have nowhere to live. My credit is shot, I can barely function and friends and family have fallen away like petals on a dying daisy. So how am I supposed to minimize stress when I have nowhere left to go?

Sadly my friends Fibromyalgia can strike hard and brutal, completely destroying some people's lives. The illness itself is awful, an unexplained pain syndrome with no modern medicinal cure and limited treatment options. But the stigma of Fibromyalgia not being a "real" illness has to be over. If someone does not believe in the validity of Fibromyalgia send them to look at the links on The Fibromyalgia Crusade website. If they know more about Fibro's validity than the CDC, WHO, FDA, NIH and Mayo Clinic, I welcome a personal introduction. At this point that is just ignorance. 

All of this awareness is about each person setting down the bag of bricks of the skepticism and doubt they have been tied too. And throwing the name Fibromyalgia back in the faces of the members of the medical community that were the ones that named it that in the first place! This illness hits some hard and knocks others off their feet. We have a responsibility to our fellow Fibrates to push awareness forward in any way we can. The above statements ring oh-so-true for entirely too many of our friends who face the hopeless and tragic situation Fibromyalgia can strip you bare and abandon you in. By looking out for each other and spreading awareness wherever possible, we are doing what it takes to push knowledge of this illness to the next level. And hopefully soon patients will be treated far better than we ever were.

Thanks for joining,
Leah

6 comments:

  1. I don't have any answers, but I can offer you my prayers on your behalf. Pray and do all you can and God will make up the rest.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hang in there. Breathe. Release. Sending prayers your way.

    --d'Arty
    www.livinginiowa.net

    ReplyDelete
  3. we have to deal with all of those things and still be able to minimize personal stress.

    for me it's like watching the news every day. i can't do it. it's too overwhelming. i don't read it and i don't watch it. maybe that makes me ignorant, irresponsible and clueless but i've learned that to take on the bigger things in life i cannot do. but i can do my part. i can make my little donations, i can volunteer a little time, i can write letters to the senate and i can blog and create awareness about fibromyalgia.

    my point is i do what i can after i break things down into manageable pieces because the bigger picture is too much for me, i get hopeless and discouraged too easily. you ask how you can minimize stress, i think it's going back to baby steps and doing anything self soothing that you can think of. do your part then self soothe. sleep, soak, let go, clean, breathe, meditate, hug a teddy bear, pamper yourself, daydream, knit, aromatherapy, yoga, pet a pet, you know the options..

    and keep breathing....
    wendy

    ReplyDelete
  4. I love this post, and it speaks for so many. You Leah are an inspiration to so many. I am gaining strength each day, just by reading your blog and realizing how others deal with this nasty thing we call FIBro. Yukkkk. But together we shall press forward, and I thank you for your courage, and wisdom. Have a wonderful, blessed EAster and enjoy the rest of this weekend!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Your post rings so true! It is so hard to decrease the stress level when life and pain are happening at once. Thanks for having the courage to place yourself out there and speaking for those of us and yourself who are in daily pain.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Leah, You just wrote my life. How can you minimize the stress when no one believes you. I recently had to let go of all my stress that has hindered me from being the person I use to be. I no longer can deal with stress in my life. I have had the weight on my shoulders so strong this past week that for the first time I lay in my bed thinking of ways to creatively end my life that wouldn't be so shocking to my loved ones. It had gotten that bad that I cried every day, mostly all day long because I was at that pinnacle point in my life that I can't take this anymore. My family want me back to who I use to be but that is not ever going to happen and I can't change that. Where does acceptance come in. Where does the boundary be drawn that everyone will get the heads up that something is seriously wrong here. When I read this post, I just sat back and sighed a really big sigh and said, "Yep, that's my life". How can I minimize the stress. At this point I am taking a frontward approach and send everyone that has doubted me the links to your site, to any fibro site and have them read and see what horrors we all face and maybe the point will be taken and maybe, just maybe I can minimize the stress in my life and move on. God bless you Leah. This really hit home for me. Love you!

    ReplyDelete