A therapy dog is a dog that is trained to provide affection, comfort, and support to people, especially those who suffer from physical or mental illnesses. They visit a variety of settings, including retirement or nursing homes, schools, hospice homes, and hospitals, but therapy dogs are also pets used directly by their owners for emotional support. Therapy dogs are different from service dogs who are trained to perform specific tasks on behalf of their owners.…
Fibromyalgia has long sat at the crossroads of neurology, rheumatology, and mental health. For years, doctors viewed it mainly as a central nervous system pain-processing problem—real, persistent, and often disabling, but difficult to pinpoint with classic laboratory tests. Now, a growing body of work points in a striking direction: the study suggests Fibromyalgia might be an immunologic disorder. If that’s right, it reframes fibromyalgia from a vague “pain condition” into a syndrome with measurable immune…
When it comes to chronic pain syndrome, there is no universal definition, but it is often explained as pain that has persisted for longer than 12 weeks, or beyond what would be expected to have been a normal healing period. What is pain? When you are suffering from pain it is hard to explain to others how you are feeling. But chronic pain is very real and can be complex. The Brain and the spinal…
Venturing out of my abode got me thinking about fickle fibromyalgia pain. Recently I have been thinking about the variety of FM symptoms because some of them overlap with chronic migraine symptoms such that I don’t know which is the cause… such as vertigo; migraine-associated vertigo or FM-related vertigo, or the balance problems and even the sensitivity to sound and light. The thing is FM came first and migraines later and then chronic migraines so…
Personal Independence Payment (or PIP) is a welfare benefit in the UK that is intended to help adults with the extra costs of living with a long-term health condition or disability. It replaced DLA (Disability Living Allowance) and if you have a long-term physical or mental health condition or disability, and are over the age of 16, you may be entitled to benefits. If you have been diagnosed with fibromyalgia you may be entitled to…
Pediatric Rheumatology Online Journal, 2012, states Juvenile Fibromyalgia (JFM) is correlated with 40% of children and teenagers who also have benign hypermobility (HM). In fact, in adults hypermobility is an often seen comorbid condition. Pediatric Rheumatology, however, undertook an observational study to see if hypermobility affects the pain experience of adolescents with juvenile fibromyalgia. It must be mentioned that juvenile fibromyalgia is a relatively new area. Often the reason it took people a decade or…
The pain and fatigue associated with fibromyalgia can leave you inactive and overweight. It is difficult for many people to feel motivated to exercise at this time of the year when the weather is cold and wet and the nights are dark, and even more so when you are in pain and exhausted. Many people with fibromyalgia find they are more sedentary than they used to be which can lead to a loss of muscle…
There was a site that had this and I had linked to it on Tumblr but it is gone. So I had to hunt down someone who found my post and posted the whole thing in a forum. Anyway, it is around but I’m posting it here so I will not have to hunt it down to reference it. Now we all know the major symptoms are the widespread pain, but our pain isn’t just…
Fibromyalgia is always difficult to diagnose, especially following a road traffic accident as it can follow on and progress from an initial injury involving whiplash. Fibromyalgia is a pain syndrome of chronic widespread musculoskeletal pain and fatigue. The pain is thought to be caused by abnormalities in the pain pathways in the central nervous system, and is most commonly caused, or exacerbated by, physical traumas, such as car accidents and falls, often due to no…
Cannabidiol (more commonly known as CBD oil) is an extract of Cannabis indica and Cannabis sativa, the same plants used to make marijuana. From oils and nasal sprays to sweets and soft drinks, CBD is becoming increasingly popular in the UK for treating and helping to relieve various conditions. CBD is said to provide relief for anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder, as well as pain relief, and there are said to be some key…