January’s coldness, dampness, and slippery stuff is about as welcome to someone with fibromyalgia as a Goth is at a Cliff Richard concert, Kryptonite to Superman, and, well you get my drift?
I also have arthritis and osteopenia (well it was at the last scan) too but the main problem is with my body’s inability to regulate temperature. I am overly sensitive to heat and cold and changes in my body temperature can be rapid, as in I’m hot one minute and icy cold the next. I no longer go out when it’s too cold or when it’s hot. If I do, I get a fibro flare up that can last for days, weeks, or even months. Put it this way, five minutes in the chilled food section in the supermarket means that I’m under a heated blanket, heating on, fire on, and I still can’t warm up hours later. Or five minutes outside in the hot sun pegging out the washing can trigger a three-day migraine. It’s shit, but the good news is that spring invariably brings some respite with drier and milder temperatures..
Maybe I’m down about January because of the state of my health? These long nights can be excruciatingly long when you have insomnia but it’s also thanks to insomnia that I’ve witnessed some truly amazing sunrises, and also two drunken men fighting in the street at 5am and both managing to hold onto their cans of Carling. (skills!!)
Drunken brawlery (not an actual word) aside, there’s also a beauty to the winter months. A fresh, crisp blanket of snow can look picturesque first thing in the morning, covering everything that’s unsightly. The trees may be devoid of their finery but bare trees make for excellent photographs. The image for this post was taken on my camera phone, I remember that had to get in as close as I could to get a clear shot and this meant getting my boots wet. My husband was encouraging me from the side-lines in his usual ‘hilarious’ neurotypical style..
Are you mad?
And then..
If you fall in, I won’t laugh much..
A somewhat confusing statement typical of the neurotypical species but it basically means that the dude would have broken a rib laughing at me had I fallen in..
Suffering for my art? Or just plain daft?
Given the health condition, I’d forgive you for going with the latter, but I happen to think the soggy socks were worth it as it’s one of my favourite shots!
January’s also the time of mass Christmas decoration disassembly. Personally I was sick of the sight of the blighters by December 28th! Ours came down on January 2nd and this time we went with an artificial tree, so no more having to spend hours hoovering up needles off the carpet, driveway, and from boot of the car. The challenge this time was how to get the tree back into the box it arrived in because they never, ever, go back in as easy as they came out, right? In the end, I ordered a Christmas tree bag off Amazon, except that I slightly overestimated the size because the bag that arrived could have fitted in everyone else’s trees, let alone ours!
In other news I’m reporting the first sighting of Easter eggs in the supermarket, yes, Easter eggs, and some supermarkets were shelving up the Easter produce on CHRISTMAS EVE!
I thought the lyrics to The Twelve Days of Christmas were ‘Five gold rings’, not five Creme Eggs?
How about supermarkets stock those ‘seasonal’ shelves with ‘wellbeing’ produce in January? Relaxing bath soaks, books about nature, sumptuous blankets (heated and otherwise) which help to ease us into a new year instead of catapulting us from one ‘season’ to the next?
My January is about listening to my body, and my body is telling me to relax under my heated blanket as often as possible. It’s telling me to knit for my grandchildren while watching Life on Mars for the trillionth time. It’s telling me to take notice of that list of allergies and intolerance’s Blu-Tacked to my cupboard door and not adopt the, ‘Oh sod it’ attitude because this only serves to cause me even more pain. It’s about letting others (paid or otherwise) execute those jobs that I used to do before my body went on the fritz. The vison is still mine, I just need to relinquish my control of the entire job…
Que the manic laughter…
What am I saying? I’m autistic!! I have to be in control of everything!! (ARGGGHHHHHH!!!)
Which is hilarious because the nature of fibromyalgia means that I am in control of sod ‘tout’ (sod all) when it comes to my own body!!
So, yeah, tough gig and all that, but I really do have to try to accept my reality and to be as positive as I can because as crap as fibromyalgia is, the pain ebbs and flows and there is always hope of a better day..
Case in point, yesterday I was in a lot of pain. I was in bed and half-heartedly contemplating throwing myself off a cliff whereas today I’m in a lot less pain, I’m up and about and life is semi-Ok – such is the nature of this condition. Hurrah for those better days!!
Here’s hoping your day is better too!
Until next time..
The Autistic Wife
The Autistic Wife 