Aa
Supportive friend with a bestie with fibro
Happy Friday~!~!~
Hello Everyone, my bestfriend suffers from fibro serverely as I am sure you all do, some better and some worse, I am sure each case is different. Well hers has gotten better but it still has it really bad days, the days where she can barely walk and to be honest I believed she would exaggerate at times, like she would say she was stuck on the toilet and couldnt even wipe, or she was to weak and had so much pain from the arthritis she has at 25 from this illness along with the nerve damage( she already had kidney problems but she drinks Dr. Pepper like its crazy so I am not too sure how true that is) and yes she knows i say that I am that good of a best fried. Anyways. On the days where her flare ups are so bad or she can feel one coming on does anyone have any advice on some things she can do to ease it or exercises she can to do help. While the medicines work some they arent a fix it, and she cant take the anti depressants for some reason, she knows everything and claims she has tried all 500 and they all make her wanna die, anyways.. any suggestions please let me know. THANK YOU!!!
Hello Everyone, my bestfriend suffers from fibro serverely as I am sure you all do, some better and some worse, I am sure each case is different. Well hers has gotten better but it still has it really bad days, the days where she can barely walk and to be honest I believed she would exaggerate at times, like she would say she was stuck on the toilet and couldnt even wipe, or she was to weak and had so much pain from the arthritis she has at 25 from this illness along with the nerve damage( she already had kidney problems but she drinks Dr. Pepper like its crazy so I am not too sure how true that is) and yes she knows i say that I am that good of a best fried. Anyways. On the days where her flare ups are so bad or she can feel one coming on does anyone have any advice on some things she can do to ease it or exercises she can to do help. While the medicines work some they arent a fix it, and she cant take the anti depressants for some reason, she knows everything and claims she has tried all 500 and they all make her wanna die, anyways.. any suggestions please let me know. THANK YOU!!!
You are a good friend to post on here. I have lupus and fibro and I have to admit I am so exhausted right now I couldn't even read the response above, sorry geminigirl. I would like to say that you might mention to her that you feel like everything is about her, but in a kind way and tell her you need to be able to talk to her about you as well. It is so easy when you are in constant pain to be so inside of yourself that you don't realize you're not giving enough to others. By the way, I would be in bed right now if it weren't for the fact that my legs hurts so bad and I am so fatigued that I can't get up from this chair and take a shower and yes I can't sleep well without a shower because I am hurting so much. Please understand that until you are living with pain you will never know what it feels like. Try to enjoy your friendship with her and let her be there for you as much as possible too. I also have a best friend and she lives here. Without her help around here this place would be unmanageable. Best of everything to you...
I try.. I want to be as supporitive as I can as hard as it maybe at times. She is a lot of work and it seems to be that everything is always always always about her and what is going on with her, but you make the best out of it and you just be there for her.
Your friend is very lucky to have a caring, concerned, involved friend like you :) It's so often so difficult for those who do not suffer from a chronic pain issue to understand the things that we go through. Believe me, I've been in the situation of being "stuck" on the toilet for a while simply because I had to muster up the strength to not only wipe, but then also to get UP off the toilet, wash my hands, and go back to bed. And yes, some days just those previously thought of as SIMPLE tasks seem near impossible.
Some of the best advice I can give you is that on those days when she tells you that she isn't feeling up to doing something (even if you've had it planned for weeks) - simply LISTEN to her and if possible, suggest something else that the two of you can do together, even if it's just sitting on the couch watching a movie. After all, the best part of a good friendship is not the "activities" or "things" that you do, it's the fact that you are doing them together. There may be days when she's feeling only up to laying on the couch and maybe not even feel up to eating much. On those days, you could make yourself available to help her with laundry, other household chores, watch the kids (if she has any), cook dinner - whatever might need to be done - so that she can take the time that she needs to take care of herself so that maybe the next day she'll be feeling better and you can go on and do the activity that you had wanted to do.
Warm baths or showers can help, as well as a heating pad/electric blanket. Some fibro sufferers do find relief with ice instead of heat, but I personally find thta cold makes my pain a LOT worse.
I also cannot take the "typical" anti-depressants that they usually try for fibro/chronic fatigue. I haven't tried "all 500", but I have tried probably at least 10 different ones and they all make me EXTREMELY hyper, can't sleep, blood pressure sky rockets, chest pains, dizziness, stomach issues (as if I didn't have enough of those with the fibro and my lupus already). I was able to tolerate Lyrica for a while, but then we had to raise my dose because it had stopped helping and with the raise in dose, I began experiencing some very serious side effects and ended up having to stop taking it completely. So your friend is not alone in this aspect of not being able to take some of the meds that could possibly help. Of course, NO medication is a guarantee to help and one med that works great for one person may not work at all for someone else.
Again, your friend is extremely lucky to have you on her side!
Some of the best advice I can give you is that on those days when she tells you that she isn't feeling up to doing something (even if you've had it planned for weeks) - simply LISTEN to her and if possible, suggest something else that the two of you can do together, even if it's just sitting on the couch watching a movie. After all, the best part of a good friendship is not the "activities" or "things" that you do, it's the fact that you are doing them together. There may be days when she's feeling only up to laying on the couch and maybe not even feel up to eating much. On those days, you could make yourself available to help her with laundry, other household chores, watch the kids (if she has any), cook dinner - whatever might need to be done - so that she can take the time that she needs to take care of herself so that maybe the next day she'll be feeling better and you can go on and do the activity that you had wanted to do.
Warm baths or showers can help, as well as a heating pad/electric blanket. Some fibro sufferers do find relief with ice instead of heat, but I personally find thta cold makes my pain a LOT worse.
I also cannot take the "typical" anti-depressants that they usually try for fibro/chronic fatigue. I haven't tried "all 500", but I have tried probably at least 10 different ones and they all make me EXTREMELY hyper, can't sleep, blood pressure sky rockets, chest pains, dizziness, stomach issues (as if I didn't have enough of those with the fibro and my lupus already). I was able to tolerate Lyrica for a while, but then we had to raise my dose because it had stopped helping and with the raise in dose, I began experiencing some very serious side effects and ended up having to stop taking it completely. So your friend is not alone in this aspect of not being able to take some of the meds that could possibly help. Of course, NO medication is a guarantee to help and one med that works great for one person may not work at all for someone else.
Again, your friend is extremely lucky to have you on her side!
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