We Have a New Advocate at NIH!

Having chronic pain is a lot like having a bleeding heart. It's not enough to kill you, but it sure puts the brakes on lots of activities you used to do or would like to do. People with FMS or CFS know.

A new physician, Dr. Bushnell, is joining the NIH under the NCCAM (for alternativ medicine) to study about the mechanisms, brain changes, and what forms of both alternative medicine/treatments and medications can be used to help people with chronic pain conditions. It's amazing the statistics in the article linked below concerning cost and lost work days due to victims of chronic pain disorders.

Please read: http://www.nih.gov/news/health/jul2012/nccam-12.htm

Make any comments you wish on this blog and share the above page with others who have chronic pain.

Yours,
Dr. Linda B. Greer

Searching for a New Facilitator

After over four years of being the facilitator for the Spartanburg FMS/CFS Support Group, I have decided to step down and let some step up to this position. We have discontinued meeting on the second Saturday of each month until someone volunteers to become the new facilitator.

I hope someone will do just that very soon. We do have some money in our treasury from an online shopping portal at www.igive.com , and it would be nice to see the money used to do a fund raising event for a donation to the American FMS Research Association to further scientific knowledge about FMS and CFS. I know one nearby group that did a fashion show for awareness and fund-raising.

Yours,
Dr. Linda B. Greer
drgreer@charter.net

Spring Cuttings Exchange and FMS Awareness Event

OK, members, lets take time out from your gardening and other stuff to come to our monthly meetings. I am rescheduling this month's meeting for Sat. March 17 and hope you can make it. We all want to see our group grow, so bring a friend with FMS and/or CFS.

Also, let's swap cuttings from our favorite plants to root for pots or gardens. I have purple heart, Boston ivy, and Wandering Jew. What will you bring? RSVP!

Now is the time to get your trees canopied, shaped and pruned before the leaves all come out. Be sure to look at where the limbs will fall before anyone starts cutting so as to protect existing gardens and shrubs! And hire someone, as you FMS and CFS will thank you for the break.

May 12 Awareness Day will be here sooner than you know (2 months). Is anyone willing to help organize a walk/run on the downtown trail? We'll need to get city permission, T-shirts, water bottles, EMT's for the faint, and do some serious advertising. If we raise funds with runners/walkers after expenses, we can send a sizeable gift toward research to AFRA.

Please give me feedback.
Your Spartanburg Facilitator
Linda Greer

Jo Jo Tabares has got a Secret Decoder!

Secret Doctor Talk Decoder Ring from http://artofeloquence.com/doctor-talk/

February 17, 2012 By Jo Jo Tabares 

 

Are you an “emotional female” droning on to your doctor, year after year. about “little things” like fibromyalgia, thyroid issues, insomnia, menopause, or hypoglycemia? Have you encountered any of the following Doctor Talk only to become confused because your brain is fuzzy from lack of sleep or the pain that is “all in your head?” Having trouble deciphering what your doctor means? Maybe you need the…
Secret Doctor Talk Decoder Ring:
* All the tests came back negative.
(Translation: I don’t know what else to do for you so you’ll just have to live with it.)
* Maybe you should take a few days off work.
(Translation: I don’t think there’s anything wrong with you, but you might feel better if you go shopping and buy a new hat.)
* Are you worried or stressed about something…how’s your family life?
(Translation: Since the tests are all negative, you must be upset about something in your life. Depressed people complain of stuff.)
* Are you sure you’re not depressed?
(Translation: You’re a hypochondriac or it’s all in your head.)
Now don’t you feel so much better?

BTW, there is a new book by Dr. Kevin White out to use as ammo against such placating "doctor speak". It's titled, Breaking through the Fibro Fog.

What do you say about this post by Jo Jo? Leave a comment below.

Favorite videos (playlist)

('http://www.youtube.com/p/7ZocNqyM75_1TrVJb6S7sg?version=3&hl=en_US',)