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',)

Great Golly, Granola Jollies!

Christmas is always a time to add some healthy snack recipes to our diet. So come join us on Saturday 10 December at 12:30 PM for 2 hours of shakin' and bakin' with some hot herbal tea on the side. Bring a container to take your share home and bring two ingredients as follows: (call me to see what we still need at 278-2018)

Large bag of walnuts or almonds (unsalted)
Vanilla flavoring (the real deal)
Safflower oil (Ingles sells it)
Brown Sugar (1 box)
Sunflower seeds (out of the shells) 2-3 cups
Ground Flax (Sam's sells it, probably at Walmart, too) 2 cups
Craisins in the large bag
Raisins in the barrel

Remember we shall reap what we sew. Think about a sewing or needlework project you'd like to share for our February meeting and bring a friend with you. January is just too cold for us to meet, so we are skipping that month to meet and allowing y'all to lose all those extra holiday pounds before coming out in public--teehee!

RSVP if you're coming to make granola--it's way better than the stuff you buy!

Your Spartanburg Facilitator,
Dr. Linda B. Greer

We Have No Granola Today!

Our November meeting did not materialize because some of our regular members were out of town and we couldn't get our ingredients together, but we will try again on Dec. 10, Saturday, at 12:30-2:30 PM. Please contact me at drgreer@charter.net for the list of ingredients for choosing 2 to bring. Also, bring a medium small tin to take home your share of the granola. It's a time-honored recipe for getting your fiber in a most delightful way!

Don't forget! Any of your extra Christian Fiction or Non-Fiction Books as well as Bibles are being collected by your facilitator, Linda Greer, to mail out to our military guys and gals in Iraq and Afghanistan. Deadline to get them to me is Nov. 30. (See FB "Books for Heroes" for more info.)

I hope you remembered all our veterans on Veterans' Day last weekend. They have helped to make this country free and keep it that way. Hurrah for the Red, White, and Blue!