CFIDS & FIBROMYALGIA Self-Help Course Week 6 Assignment: Managing Emotions

CFIDS & FIBROMYALGIA Self-Help Course Week 6: Managing Emotions Feelings such as worry, frustration, sadness and loss are common and understandable responses to long-term illness. They are a result of the changes, limitations and uncertainty brought by illness. Managing feelings deserves a place in your self-management plan, just because they are so common. There are two additional reasons as well. First, CFS and fibromyalgia often make emotional reactions stronger than they were before and harder to control. People often say they cry more frequently, get upset more easily or have more angry outbursts than before they were ill. The intensification of feelings applies to positive emotions as well as negative, experiences like seeing a sunset or enjoying a family gathering. Any experience that triggers the production of adrenaline intensifies emotions and, often, makes symptoms worse as well. Second, emotions can interact with symptoms in a vicious cycle. For example, being in constant pain can trigger worries about the future. Worry leads to muscle tension, which, in turn, increases pain. You can interrupt this cycle in several ways, for example by learning relaxation to reduce muscle tension or by changing your “self-talk” to reduce worry. Depression Depression is common in people with CFS and fibromyalgia. Some of the depression is situational, a reaction to the limits, disruption, losses and uncertainty brought by long-term illness. This type of depression is captured in the remark, “Who could have these conditions and not be depressed?” Self-management strategies are often helpful in response to this type of depression. Depression may be biochemical, as well, created by changes in the chemistry of the brain. Self-management strategies may also be useful for this type of depression, but treatment normally includes medication, too. Loss CFS and fibromyalgia usually bring many serious losses. We often experience loss of control over our bodies, loss of friends and loss of valued activities. We may be forced to give up our job and thereby lose income, companionship and challenge. And often we have to abandon dreams, thus losing the future we had envisioned for ourselves. In sum, we experience the loss of the person we used to be and the person we hoped to become. Loss can trigger a variety of reactions, including denial, worry, anger, guilt, and sadness. An individual may experience some, but not necessarily all, of these reactions, may experience some more than once or may feel more than one at the same time. Working through loss is often a several year process, normally ending in acceptance. Acceptance combines recognition that life has changed with a realization of the need to lead a different kind of life than before.
 
This Week's Assignments
Discussion:What do you do to help yourself feel better when you’re feeling blue? What strategies help you work through the losses brought by your illness?
Target: Report on the target you set last week.
 
What do you do to help yourself feel better when you’re feeling blue?
 
One of my first resorts when I'm feeling down is to have something to eat, even just a small snack – just an Ensure will do if I'm completely wiped out. One of my next resorts is to take a nap.
 
Some of my other favorite tactics are to read an engrossing novel (I'm a huge Stephen King fan, and his stories definitely sweep me up) or watch videos on Netflix. I like to binge-watch TV shows that I missed for whatever reason when they came out.
 
One of the first things I learned to do for myself when I was at my worst, physically and emotionally, is what I call Laughter Therapy – watch stand-up comics doing their thing on Netflix or Comedy Central.
 
If I have the energy to get out and walk, or even just sit in the sunshine, that helps me a lot. I live in the city now, but I still love to see nature, no matter how little. Even just a bit of grass or a dandelion pushing through a crack in the pavement cheers me.
 
What strategies help you work through the losses brought by your illness?
 
I try not to look backwards at what I USED to be able to do; I try to focus on what I still CAN do. I learned this strategy when I was working my way out of a deep, decades-old depression. Looking back at events that caused me shame or guilt did not serve me; far better to start from where I am now and apply what I've learned.
 
Likewise, I used to be able to do all sorts of things that I can't do any more, and it helps me to remember that many of them are beyond my reach simply because I'm in my 50s instead of my 20s. Yes, this illness has taken many things away from me, but not everything. I still have a good – if often brain-fogged – mind; I can still walk, live on my own, manage my own money and bills, drive... and write. That's not bad.
 
Finally, sharing with others, for example here, and on Dailystrength.com. I hope and like to think that others might find my experiences and perspectives useful in their own lives.
 
 
Target Report:
 
Target: To rest before tired an hour at a time twice a day or more as needed
 
Results: I am still at my GF's and have been meeting this target since I arrived last Thursday and have been resting more as needed. No crashes.
 
Lessons: This is by far the most ambitious thing I've tried to do since CFS/SEID entered my life. My success with this target so far is just more proof to me what a powerful tool pre-emptive rest is in managing the illness.
 
I will be here until next Tuesday, when I will fly (and take the bus, and take the bus) to get home, so my
 
New Target: will be to maintain this target for another week and arrive home at least mostly un-crashed.