Flare Up

 Unfortunately I'm going through a flare up right now. Worst part is I was hired back part time under at World Market. The flare up has been causing such bad pain that I cry at times. So, it's difficult to work under these circumstances, and had to resign from working. I went to my doctor and I'm adding a new medicine to my regimen, amitriptyline. I hope it helps my insomnia and pain because it's difficult dealing with it. It's hard because I want to be out and doing things, but my body hurts and I get exhausted when I have barely done anything. Today I was walking around a lot and now my feet are swollen. You can barely see the lines in my toes, and there are no lines or veins on the top of my feet. I am on a diuretic, but only every other day. I think it needs to be every day since it's not really helping.
 
On the optimistic side of life I am very hopeful in the success of my jewelry business. I am an independent consultant for a company called Paparazzi. I have had success with only having very little inventory. This next weekend I am going to vendor at a Craft Sale and I will have some new inventory to show. I hope this helps get my name more out there. There aren't any other consultants for the company in the tri-city area I live in. So, I don't have much competition! The company and the jewelry is great! It's five dollar jewelry that is super cute and trendy. I even sell little girls jewelry! It's fun to get to know new people through this. I just really hope to have the energy and excitement so people can really tell I love Paparazzi! I ordered some stuff for advertisement and promotion. I got a banner for my table at shows and what not, a t-shirt that says, "I heart Paparazzi!", and also some business cards. I plan on handing them out to everyone I meet. Good night, and have a fabulous day! :)

Here are some of the products from Paparazzi! Check out my Facebook page for more inventory, information about Paparazzi, and a fabulous contest!

www.Facebook.com/

accesorizeyou

(yes accessorize is spelt wrong in the URL so type it exactly as it is with one less S in the URL name)

Explaining Fibromyalgia

My lovely wedding photographer, Jessica, wanted me to better explain what exactly Fibromyalgia is. Fibromyalgia is a pain filled disease. It causes fatigue, stiffness, pain, which then leads to depression.

How does it cause this? Well, the brain sends pain signals when not needed. So, say I get hit in the arm running into something, I'm using this example because it happened the other day. Instead of it just hurting for a day, it hurts for a lot longer. I didn't even get a bruise after I ran into a display peg at work, but it hurt so bad I was in tears off and on the next day. Also, you just get these pains randomly. You don't have to hurt yourself on something. You get a stiff thigh muscle and it just constantly hurts and then goes away. Sometimes its a couple hours, sometimes a day. I also get flare ups. This is when I get horrible pains that make me cry for a couple days, a week, two weeks. These pains are more persistent and painful than usual. The usual pains I have gotten used to and don't really take pain pills for, but when I have a flare up the only thing that takes away the pain is vicodin or something to that extreme. Don't think that just because I have gotten used to the daily pain that it doesn't hurt. It still does. I just can't take anything for it that helps. Like the flare up pain, ibuprofen, tylenol, advil, anything over the counter does not help.

The fatigue is pretty much annoying and ridiculous. Some days all I can do is laundry for thirty minutes and then I'm exhausted. Then there are others where I can go almost all day without being exhausted. Right now in my flare up I could sleep twenty hours during the day. Most other times when you sleep that long people say well you are only tired because you are sleeping so much. Unfortunately with Fibromyalgia if I don't sleep as much as I need then I get sick and more pains than normal. I also get insomnia. This is due to the pain. When I try and go to sleep I can't because all I can think about is the pain that I am having.

Unfortunately, as most pain diseases cause this, depression gets pretty bad with Fibromyalgia. It's hard to stay positive when you are dealing with a disease with no cure. Also, there are many things that help the symptoms, but nothing that cures it completely. The depression comes on more when you have bad days. Mainly because you want to get things done, and just can't because you feel so horrible and so much pain.

In conclusion I have found yoga is great because it stretches your muscles. Obviously I don't mean go out there and be as flexible as Gumby. Pace yourself and don't do anything that you think might hurt because it probably will. That is the only thing I have so far learned. If you have any advice please comment.

It's been a while...

It has been forever since I have wrote on here. I must say that marriage is amazing, and extremely difficult. Learning to be one person with someone else is difficult. People you were once friends with start to grow away from you, you find out ugly things about yourself, but it doesn't matter because I am learning so much even through the bad. What does suck is I feel myself in a depressed state sometimes and in horrible pain. What can I do? Really just try to relax and breathe. I find the more I stress myself the worse I get the depression back and the worse my pain gets. I do need to write more on this blog. After each post I feel less stressed. Even if no one reads it I feel like someone is listening. Someone has to be listening. I hope through this I help other people and I always feel better about my life if I help someone else.

This Weekend

   It has been a good and painful weekend. Saturday I went to Phoenix with my family to celebrate my nephews birthday. I had a good time. Driving up there was an adventure on it's own because my IBS medicine decided to kick in. Before the birthday party we stopped by the mall. I finally picked out the undershirts for my bridesmaid dresses. Now I can check that off of my list. We arrived at my brother's house a little early for the party so we could visit. I held my niece most of the time and chatted with my sister in law who is on bed rest. We had a good conversation. Now what is bugging me is that the medicine I'm on is helping a lot, but I still can't control the pain. So, during my follow up appointment with my doctor I need to ask him what can I take that will make the pain go away. If anyone has suggestions let me know. My family is so supportive and kind with all of this. It's hard to stay happy and peppy when you are in pain and exhausted, but I am giving it my all. 
   Tomorrow I have an interview for a sales position at a photo studio. Hopefully I will get the job because I am getting married in December and I need a job. The job search has just started too. So I am blessed that the job search may be over after a very short time of searching. Thank you all for your prayers and support.

Love,
Kaitlynn

Far From Perfect and Pleasant

So, today reading some other women's stories about their trials with fibromyalgia I have learned it's okay to not always be perfect and pleasant with it. I usually try to be extremely positive with everything, but some days I just get annoyed with it. I love everyone's positive outlooks and most days feel that way myself because I know the only way to really get through it all is with positive thoughts. It's just sometimes the pain is intense and I don't like it at all, and I don't feel like being positive. So going out to one of the days that are few, but are there. This is not easy and it's going to take time and practice to learn to cope without getting irritated. It's irritating that the fibromyalgia causes these other pains and illnesses; IBS, headaches, fatigue, and just getting irritated. So, I am hoping for a more positive day tomorrow as I go to Phoenix with my family for my nephews birthday party. :)

"Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow." 

-Albert Einstein

The Beginning

   God created the world and that's what we think of as "The Beginning". Really it wasn't there is so much more before that; the war in heaven, we all chose to be here (and not follow Satan), and there was just everything that we still don't remember from then. Well my diagnosis isn't really the beginning of my journey either. It really is just the most relieving part of it so far.

   At 16 I had a really unusual virus that affected my mouth, throat, I ran a horrible fever even with meds to reduce it; basically it was almost like strep or mono , but both those tests came back negative. Then after two weeks it went away and then I got another infection. I went to the doctor and had C-Difficile. If you don't know what that is, look it up. It's not pleasant. After that was healed I started noticing intense change in sensation, lots of pain, and serious fatigue. I went to the hospital and they could not find anything so I was sent home. Then the cycle kept occurring. My primary doctor could not find anything wrong, although he definitely could tell something was. He did treat me for many thing trying to see if it would help. He even treated me for fibromyalgia when I was about 17, but I had bad reactions to the drugs he put me on so he moved on to the next thing. Then I started seeing a new doctor when I was still 17. He referred me to a neurologist, but he couldn't do anything because I wasn't in a "spell". So, I was told that the next time I felt the symptoms flare up to go to the Phoenix Children's Hospital. There they ran so many tests I really cannot even begin to tell you. Still their staff came to me and said we are sorry to tell you that we do not have an answer. So, I just dealt with it till now. I went to my doctor and said I really want to revisit the idea of it being fibromyalgia because it really is the only thing that the doctors thought it could be that made sense. So he said, "That's a definite possibility." So he did the pressure point test, and all of them really bugged me bad. He asked me lots of questions about the condition and then told me to stretch, do light exercise, and take this medicine Celexa.

   So with all that being said, I guess I am at the beginning just of a new chapter in learning how to deal with this. So I am writing this blog to learn, to inform, and to get through it all.

   Best thing I heard tonight that is getting me through, "You can ... use your time wisely while you wait for your prayers to be answered." -Debbie Vermilyea (fellow fibromyalgia blogger)