People are well-meaning, but their lack of understanding about fibro is sometimes astonishing! Like many other things related to fibromyalgia, if we don't laugh...

For the 2001 contest, we invited wallabies to share some of those bloopers with the FMPSC fm'ly, to tell us about some of the dumb, foolish or outrageous things folks have said about fibro.

"I heard you have fibro. That's too bad. Does it hurt?"

For some time my mother-in-law would keep asking me if I WAS BETTER YET? (there is a somewhat happy ending - Finally she just asks how I am feeling - and of course I dont get into too much detail 'cause who would really believe all the junk related to fibro except the rest of us fibrofolks!)

A fellow nurse and I were taking reports on our patients for the night. It is well known on our unit that i have fibromyalgia. She was told that her patient had the diagnosis of fibromyalgia. She said to me,"oh man, don't you just hate taking care of patients with that? All they do is gripe and whine about how bad they hurt. You'd think there was something really wrong with them"

A member of our church asked me one time how I was feeling. I told her not too bad. She asked me then, "How long are you going to keep this fibromyalgia thing. Isn't it about time you got over it?"

I overheard a physician explaining to the husband of a patient newly diagnosed with fibromyalgia about the disease. He said,"Well it's a diagnosis we give when we really can't find anything wrong and they keep complaining. I usually let them wallow in the name for a while and then send them to a shrink. Most of them perk up after several trips where they can pour their heart out to someone they think wants to listen."

The same person has said this to me more than once.
Conversation goes like this:
"Where do you hurt?"  "Everywhere"

"Is it your stomach?"  "No, it's everywhere"

"Is it your back again?" "No, my entire body hurts."

"Well, exactly what hurts?"   "All of me hurts, every joint, my skin burns, gotta run, see you later"

Telling someone you have Fibromyalgia - they have never heard of it. I say, "Have you heard of chronic fatigue ?" They always say yes. I say it is similar but you also have all over body pain. They always say  "Yea I get tired a lot too and my back is killing me."

A new co-worker noticed me limping one day and commented that I must be having a hard day.  (She already knows me from another job and knows I have Fibromyalgia).  Anyway, I said that yes, I was in a big flare and was hoping just to make it through the day.  With a smile on her face she said " a friend of mine was just diagnosed with Fibromyalgia.  They did a complete hysterectomy and now she is feeling fine.  It cured her".  She also suggested that I check it out with my gynecologist.  I swallowed hard to refrain from physical violence and gently said that yes, a lot of people get misdiagnosed and many illnesses can have the same symptoms.  It wasn't until later when I had cooled down that I wished I had asked her  how that would help men with fibro and women who have fibro but no uterus...ah well, another day.   :-)

The other day one of my friends said to me "I know you told me you have Fibroidmyalgia. How many fibroids do you have, and where do they hurt?"

In my case it's what I tell myself, since I rarely discuss it with anyone. "If I ignore the pain then it will go away" or "If I blame the pain on something other than FM then I really don't have a serious problem" or some other form of denial.

Conversation between me and someone old enough to be my mother - "What did they say you had dear? Fry something? You won't know what pain is like until you're older!"