MOREDD6797’s Profile

Close Fibromyalgia

I was diagnosed with lupus in 2004. My lupus was on a major rampage at the time of diagnosis. It seems to love my heart, kidneys and liver. I've had more heart infections than I can count. I'm having problems with liver stones again (had a surgery in 2004) and it looks like I will be having to have surgery soon for the stones. I had to stop working in September of 2005 due to problems with lupus. I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia in October 2007. I tried going back to work this year but I was unsuccessful. I have chronice full body joint and muscle pain. I am now taking two narcotics 24/7. Some days I can do things but I have more bad days than good. I have gained 70lbs in the last year which definitely is not helping with my body pain. My list of doctors just seems to continue to go up. I feel like my life is nothing but doctor appointments. My other problems include chronic migraines that are so severe that I am down for days at a time and I get at least one a week. Muscle spasms in my neck and shoulder area. I am now on muscle relaxers that help a bit. I run a low grade fever virtually all the time. My doctors have just discovered a large tumor on my thyroid that has attached itself to my esophogus. I am now waiting to see the specialist to find out what my options are. I'm having really severe pain in my heals. Not in the center of them but I guess you could say the edges of my heels. This is making it very difficult to walk most days. I can't stand for more than maybe 15 minutes on a good day. My fatigue just seems to be getting worse and worse. My rhuemetologist has decided to take me off the steroids which I am not happy about. They were helping me with energy. So now all I want to do is sleep. I was diagnosed with sleep apnea this year. I now use an apnea machine when I sleep. And even though my fatigue is so bad I battle with bouts of insomnia. This has been very difficult for me to accept mentally. I have always been very independant and having to rely on others to do my housework, grocery shopping, drive me to appointments and even some days I can't even walk to the bathroom by myself. I have more days that I am in bed because I just don't have the energy to get up and do anything. I have alot of nights that my daughter sleeps with me to help me get to the bathroom or do anything that I should need. My kids have become my nurses and that bothers me a lot. I applied for disability this year and I was turned down. No surprise there considering it was my first time applying. But I did get a lawyer for this second go around. I want to make sure that I have made no mistakes in my application process. So I am hoping that I will get lucky and I will get approved for at least SSI while I am trying to get SSD. Oh and one more thing I want to add. My sister was just diagnosed last month with fibromyalgia. Well I will end this for now. My reasoning for joinging this group is to make some new friends that can understand what I am going through. Thank you for reading my story, Michelle

Treatments

Support from Friends & Family Working / Worked

My family has been wonderful trying to understand what I am going through. But there are days that my kids have a very difficult time handling it. And I dont blame them. There are times when they have to cancle plans because of a bad day. Its just not fair to them.