Beyond the diagnosis: Fighting the stigma

So, here's the thing. Normally, when I write an entry, I have this previous image of how it may turn out and I usually have gone back and forth about the topic and the way I want to portray it. As for this piece, I have no idea how it will result because I don't know if it's an honest reflexion or the consequence of a high fever and lots of medications. Let me explain. For the past 5 days I've been home to a wonderful bacteria that has taken my larynx and joints as hostages, swelling and infesting them up and giving me what is best known as laryngitis and reactive arthritis. That, plus the flu-like symptoms which have woken up the best assets of fibromyalgia and asthma, have really made of the past week a very difficult one health-wise. For that, I haven't been able to get out of bed which has really brighten up my holiday spirit, that was previously non existent. As part of this crappy week, there has been a lot of sleepless nights: It wasn't just courtesy of ...

Hoy me despido del que pensé que sería el último año de mi vida. Hoy le digo adiós al 2016, hoy vivo un día que juré, en mil momentos, que no lograría verlo en vida. 2016, fuiste mi Everest. Fuiste mi enemigo número 1. Fuiste una cadena de eventos, que no me atrevo a decir que fueron desafortunados, pero que me cambiaron la vida. Te odie, te detesté, intenté escapar de todas las formas posibles, exceptuando claramente la muerte (Porque soy una gallina o porque Dios es muy grande, o las dos). Internet y las noticias tampoco te ayudaban, fuiste un año extrañísimo y francamente fuiste un año sorprendente en términos de elecciones, de violencia, de maldad, de premios Oscar (tal vez Leonardo DiCaprio fue de las pocas personas que pueden decir que el 2016 fue un gran año). Y sigo viva... Creo que la vida, las tradiciones, han puesto mucha cargo en los años y especialmente en los fines de año. Hay como esta carga mística que dice que el 31 de Diciembre, cuando el reloj marque las 12, s...

It's harder than you think it'll ever be. It's more exhausting than you ever felt before. But you keep on going. Why? How? Who? You wonder and wonder. Why you? Who chose you? How will you deal with it? For how long? With what purpose? Will those answers matter? Probably the only one that truly would make an impact is if someone could help you finding out a meaning, and a way for all of this. The rest... Would it be better if someone gave you a time limit of the symptoms? An expiration date? Or if they told you it'll be as long as your life. Would it be better if you could blame it on someone? On your parents for the genetics? On God for placing this cross on your path? On destiny for choosing you? On every single person that has ever hurt you in a way or another, even if it wasn't in purpose? Would it be easier if you knew why all this suffering? How about because it was the only way you could truly be empathic with others? Or because you needed to be ripped apa...

Pain changes people. It changes how we approach to life, how we live our daily activities, what we want, or what we are afraid about. You can't avoid it, pain demands to be felt with every fiber of your skin, and once this happens, your life or who you are is changed somehow. You can't explain how it changed you, why it happened or how to turn it back. You only know that you aren't the person you used to be before the painful experience. In the past 2-3 years, I've felt more pain than I had ever felt in a lifetime, and I've changed. I'm not the same person I was 3 years ago, or even, a year ago. Eventhough I was heart-broken last year because of the realization that my parents were no longer together, the crisis haven't struck yet, so I was somehow positive, in love, and the shock of the moment kind of numbs you from the pain. I have always had this habit of, in December, looking back and see how things have changed. And even if last Christmas was hard and...

"I feel like I'm going crazy" I've talked a lot about depression, I think it's easier to identify what it is because I remember the time in which I had no depressive symptoms. When it came along in my journey it changed who I was, how I felt and my notion of life was turned around. But with anxiety it's different. I've always been anxious and frankly I can't think about a time in which I didn't had that type of thoughts or in which my mind worked in any other way. I was the little girl whose mind was way too negative and way too extreme, who worried about everything waaaay too much, that was constantly nervous and scared and bit her nails. I remember when little being absolutely terrified about my parents going to an event without me because I immediately thought something bad was going to happen to them, they might die or something like that. Or being absolutely afraid of the dark because I thought someone will appear at my room at night. Or fee...

Dear people who've told me fibromyalgia doesn't exist for the past 4 years: Hello there. First of all, merry christmas and a happy new year. I hope your life is doing fine, and I wish that you are enjoying the seasons' celebrations. As for me, I'm writing this after a very tough episode of fibromyalgia, and I'm in a rush to type this letter as I don't want to forget any detail of what I felt the past days. I know I'm no doctor, I'm just a simple psychology student who was her life ahead and still got a lot to learn. Still, I'm trying to talk about those topics in which I have experience, and therefore, I feel my experience is valid and true. As for that, I may not be able to explain to you what is fibromyalgia. It's new and unknown in the medical world (as far as I've heard) and there is still A LOT of research needed to be done. I've heard it's a muscular thing, a nervous system thing, a psicosomatic thing, a genetic thing... For m...