Riding it Out

There have been no postings for a few days because I caught a cold. My wife caught the same thing at the same time, so we were both down with it. The difference for her is that she can take cold medicines. The drugs I am on do not play nice with other drugs. I can't take decongestants or other types of drugs that you typically take with a cold or flu. I just have to ride it out.

That is sort of the essence of fibromyalgia. When a symptom hits, there is nothing I can take to make that symptom better. I ride it out. There are things you can take on a regular basis that might reduce your symptoms in severity overall, but nothing you can take that I am aware of on a symptom by symptom basis. If I get pain, pain killers have no effect. When I get foggy, I can't just pop a pill to clear my head. When exhaustion hits, I can't chug a five hour energy drink and feel reinvigorated (although some people report that this helps, while others report that it causes a bad crash afterwards).

Getting a cold or flu is just like everything else. I just have to wait for it to pass. It finally has, and I am back to posting.