I remember the moment I realized something might be wrong. I was on a road trip with my parents to go visit family in another state. I had been sitting in the back seat of the car for about four hours when we decided to make a pit stop for gas and snacks. I got of the car and I remember feeling so very stiff. I decided to try to stretch it out. Having made this trip before, I had a few routine stretches that I liked to do. Touching my toes, twisting at the waist, extending my arms, calf stretches, etc. They always made me feel better. Only that time, I couldn’t bend over to touch my toes. I couldn’t even get half way down my legs. At the time I remember laughing about it with my mom. We joked about how I was just getting old and needed to exercise more. But in my head I was thinking “Huh, that’s not right. Why can’t I do this? Why does it hurt when I try?”

Looking back now, its funny to me because I don’t remember anything else about that trip except for that moment. That was about four years ago.

It took me a while before it started to sink in that I needed to talk to a doctor. Little by little mornings were getting harder, the stiffness was getting worse, and I was starting to feel this weird all-over tingling sensation that I couldn’t even begin to describe. At the time I was seeing a chiropractor. In the five months before, I had suffered two back to back herniated disks. One in my neck, and one in my low back. The one in my neck was pressed up against my spinal cord. Both were excruciatingly painful. When the fibro symptoms began, I was toward the end of my treatments for the disks and in recovery. I was also doing quite well… except for these odd new problems.

My mother, a nurse, suggested to me that I might have Fibromyalgia. I had never heard that word before. I had no idea what she was talking about. I didn’t think I wanted to know either. It sounded awful. But, I decided to talk to my chiropractor anyway. He did a simple test. He gently pressed on ten specific points on my back with his thumbs. With every point, I screamed. By the time he was done, I was crying from the pain. He then helped me get up from his table and looked at me and said, “I’m sorry. Yes, you do have Fibromyalgia.”

The rest of the day, I was in a state of shock. I had no idea what I was facing. I also decided not to tell anyone other than my parents. Not even my brothers. I didn’t want anyone to know. I had this crazy idea in my head that if I could just keep quiet about it and pretend like nothing was wrong, it would go away and everything would be fine. For a while, a short while, it worked. I went on with my life as if nothing was wrong. I pretended that my new morning routine of needing help to get out of bed, having so much pain coursing all throughout my body that it moved me to tears, and walking like some sort of hunchbacked tin man, was all perfectly fine because I did it all in private. When I left the apartment, no one could see it so therefore it didn’t matter. Only….. it did.

It took me four or five months before I told my brothers. Even longer before I told my friends. Three years before I told the people I work with. Now, year four, almost to the date of being diagnosed with it – I am telling the world. I have Fibromyalgia and it isn’t something that should be ignored. Not now, not ever. Not by me or by anyone. Fibromyalgia is a REAL and complex illness with dreadful and permanent life altering effects. It is time that Fibro Fighters everywhere come out of our hiding spots and say “Hey, you know what?! I have Fibromyalgia and it sucks!!!”

The talking starts now.