You ain't nothin' but a hound dog

When I was little bitty baby my mama would … push my bassinet up against our console stereo speakers. My favorite lullaby was Hound Dog by Elvis Presley. I fell asleep to Elvis each night, and I became accustomed to music of my parents' generation at a very early age. It was no surprise when my sister was born 3 1/2 years after me, and I decided that we needed to call her "Bo" for Bo Diddley.

As I grew older I started discovering music that I liked, not just what my parents liked. At age five I liked my 45's – A Spoonful of Sugar and other Disney classics. By the age of seven, I moved to 8 tracks - Joy to the World by Three Dog Night. By nine I had a mix of vinyl and 8 tracks - I was a huge Partridge Family fan.

While listening to The Partridge Family Notebook, I realized that some singers did not write their own music – in fact, only David Cassidy and Shirley Jones actually sang on the album. I started looking for singer-songwriters. I wanted to know who wrote the great songs. I discovered Mac Davis and Dolly Parton. I dreamed of one day learning to play acoustic guitar and writing songs like they did.
My anthem became Mac Davis' song, "I Believe in Music". 
 

Music is love, and love is music, if you know what I mean.

People who believe in music are the happiest people I’ve ever seen.

…

Music is the universal language, and love is the key.

To peace, hope and understanding, and living in harmony.

…

I, I believe in music.

Oh, I believe in love.

I went to college in the early 80's, so of course I listened to Culture Club, Rick Springfield, and Duran Duran - on cassettes instead of vinyl or 8 tracks. I carried my huge cases of cassettes from dorm room to apartment. Many nights I had to use a pencil eraser to rewind the tape onto the cassette.

Fast forward many years, my cassettes being thrown in boxes under the bed as I moved to CDs. I discovered an entire group of female singer songwriters who wrote folk/punk/rock blends - Indigo Girls, Ani DeFranco, Dar Williams, Catie Curtis, Michelle Malone, to name a few.

Many people download music digitally, but I continue to seek out independent music stores to buy CDs. I love the liner art and physically holding the CD.

I love to attend concerts when the fibro allows me to, although I typically suffer for days later. Music helps me cope with my fibromyalgia. It calms me, reduces stress, and sometimes makes pain seem less painful. In the months to come I plan to tell you all about the CDs I am listening to, concerts I attend, and songs that make me ponder fibro. Do you believe in music?

You got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em…

Starting sometime in the early 90’s, I remember asking people, “What do you do with your hands at night while you sleep?” Mostly I received blank stares from people who obviously had never thought about their hands at night. I guess, like most body parts, we don’t think about what happens to them when we are slumbering. Well, my hands were hurting at night even way back then, decades before from my fibromyalgia diagnosis.

My hands hurt at night, and many times I cannot find a comfortable place to put them while sleeping. From the 90s up until a few years ago, doctors would say that it must be carpal tunnel syndrome. They would hand me a brace to sleep in and send me on my way. I thought I looked like a Borg from Star Trek when I strapped on my brace. Who knew that many years later I would end up wearing assorted medical devices at night just to limit the daily pain?

Fast forward many years, and I still do not know what to do with my hands while I sleep. I start the night with them folded (ever conscious of not bending them at the wrist) on one another somewhere near my face as I try to fall asleep on my side. As they start to hurt I straighten my arms and lay them at my side. Sometimes, the hand pain seems to migrate up the arm, and I have to spread out like I am being crucified to get relief. Hanging them off the bed makes them fall asleep. Bending at the wrist has a pins and needles effect. If I start to worry about them, I clinch them, which causes more pain. No matter where they go, they feel heavy and throb. Many nights they feel swollen. Occasionally I get a sharp, stabbing pain like the ones I get in my knees when I sleep. I have to move them immediately – they feel like they will break if I don’t.

Last week, when my hands had a particularly bad night, I decided to try the compression gloves I had heard about for arthritis. I perused my local Walgreen’s and found the beige ones that make me think of Halloween or really old people. They were a tad too creepy for me to purchase, so I started looking online. I found a site called TommieCopper.com that sells compression items (gloves, shirts, knee sleeves, etc.) that don’t look creepy. It may be an old home remedy that copper helps pain, but I was sold once I read that the cute, black gloves were infused with copper yarn. I ordered a pair of fingerless compression gloves that claim to ‘reduce swelling and increase range of motion in hands and fingers for a great night’s sleep.’

My gloves, pictured at the beginning of the post, arrived Saturday. I have slept in them for two nights, and am wearing them as I key this post into my computer. It is too early to tell if they increase my range of motion, but I believe they helped my hands while I slept. I will continue to wear them and post my results soon.  Do your hands hurt at night? If so, what works for you?

Why hang on tight?

I was at a concert Saturday night (yes, I paid for it on Sunday and Monday) when Emily Saliers introduced a new song as a happy, apocalyptic, typical Indigo Girls song about death. Obligatory laughter came from the audience, and as the song started I thought about one of my favorite genres of movies - apocalypse, post-apocalyptic, dystopian society type movies.

Why am I attracted to this type of movie or song? I believe that there is hope to be found in these movies and songs. The old saying goes, "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger." Fibromyalgia tries daily to steal the life from me, almost as if I were in a post-apocalyptic world of pain and chaos. The symptoms of my fibro are just varied enough to sometimes give me hope, the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel.

I do have some good days, days where I am reminded of what is was like before I had fibromyalgia. Days before every fiber of my being ached with stabbing pains and sleep was not elusive. For every good day, I have two bad days. But the good days, give me a glimmer of hope, a melody of a possible miracle. Could I possibly have two days in a row without pain? Maybe three? A week? A month? Maybe be healed?

I have seen enough end-of-the-world movies to know that one doesn't miraculously return to the pre-apocalyptic life. My fibromyalgia is not miraculously going to disappear. But many times in the movies, the folks work together to build a future that is good, that is better than the bad days.

Please join me in creating a community of people with fibromyalgia, auto-immune diseases, or chronic pain who are free enough to speak of the dark side, hopeful enough to acknowledge the good side, and smart enough to Hang On Tight.