Blog

Between the damage from the big flare in 2004, as well as acquiring fibromyalgia around the same time, a number of interesting twists have been added to my life, the main one having become ridiculously sensitive. A millimeter’s worth of change can throw me off completely, triggering a cascading fibro flare with all its attendant wonder of symptoms. Change isn’t the only thing that does it, it can also be stress or physical strain and inevitably, it feels as if something really major has gone wrong with the way I’m sitting in my wheelchair. That usually brings along the aforementioned wonder of symptoms, which in addition to pain, includes a healthy dollop of anxiety. Half the time, it feels like I’m crazy and I’ve gotten used to it. I know that when something’s been done to my motors requiring me to sit with the back half of the chair lifted up in the air, I’ll feel like I’m sliding out of the chair for the next few days. Traveling more than 10 minutes in a van or bus means several days’ worth of feeling like I’m sitting on cement instead of a foam cushion. And so on. The anxiety enters the picture because my body is constantly sending out an alarm, blaring IT’S WRONG! SOMETHING’S WRONG! WHOOP, WHOOP, WHOOP!! I know it’s my body having a reaction, but it’s still really freaky.

Last Friday, one of my attendants leaned on the right upper half of the back of my wheelchair while assisting me with something. She’s done this before. In fact, she is done this a couple times a week for years and nothing’s ever happen. Not that day, however. Last Friday, I could feel the back of the chair give and move as she leaned down and when she stopped, the back of the chair moved forward again. This was rather alarming. I spent the next several days being absolutely convinced that the back of my chair was wonky, that somehow this had caused a very solid shell upon which the back cushion is placed to warp and recline further on the right. Naturally, this event also triggered a massive fibro flare, which caused the kind of pain I haven’t experienced in a long time. In fact, it was so bad I felt like crying and I don’t often cry because of pain.

I did a lot of looking at the back of my chair when I wasn’t in it, as well as looking for old photos where I could see that area of my chair with me in it. Nothing seemed different. Still, it felt as if I was constantly sliding out of the chair and my right shoulder didn’t feel is supported as I was sure it’d been before. I started thinking that perhaps it was the fact that my left foot rest had slid down about a millimeter and gotten stuck, but that’s happened before and this didn’t feel quite like that. This felt very much like my right shoulder wasn’t right and when my shoulder isn’t right, my neck gets very unhappy, too. This wasn’t helped by the fact that the way I leaned my head on my headrest also seemed somewhat wrong. I looked again and again and again and could see nothing. I got The Boy to take a look and he couldn’t see anything different with the chair, although he did say that my left shoulder seemed further down than normal. Still, with nothing obviously wrong, it had to be my body. Right?

By about Tuesday, I’d adapted and although it still didn’t feel quite right, the pain was less and I’d convinced myself it was either the foot rest or the usual: that I was crazy (i.e., my body was having conniptions). Nonetheless, I decided to go see Dave the Wonder Repair Guy to get the foot rest dealt with, as well as another couple of small things. While I was there, I’d ask him about the back of the wheelchair. Just for peace of mind. He knows that my body often has hysterics, so I don’t feel so