Fibromyalgia is a chronic, or long-term, disorder defined by pain and tenderness throughout your body, accompanied by fatigue. While these are the most common symptoms, fibromyalgia can be accompanied by a wide range of symptoms, some of which are better known than others. Knowing about these rare fibromyalgia symptoms is the first step toward learning how to cope with their effects.
Fibromyalgia Symptoms You Probably Don’t Know About
Heightened Sensitivity to Touch
It’s thought that fibromyalgia disrupts the systems in the brain that are responsible for modulating your experience of pain and that this disruption is responsible for the heightened sensory sensitivities that can accompany the condition.
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One way this hypersensitivity can manifest is allodynia, which is when you feel pain from a touch- or temperature-related stimulus that wouldn’t normally be painful.
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“Our body has to process all of the information that’s constantly coming in by way of the senses and filter out 99 percent of it,” says Jacob Teitelbaum, MD, the author of From Fatigued to Fantastic. “Separating the signal from the noise, so to speak, takes energy, and energy is precisely what people with fibromyalgia don’t have.”
Experiencing these heightened sensitivities, alone or in combination with one another, can quickly become overwhelming and make day-to-day activities difficult.
How to Cope With Sensory Sensitivities
To start with, it’s important to be very gentle with your body, says Aly Cohen, MD, a fellow of the American College of Rheumatology (ACR) and the founder of Integrative Rheumatology Associates and TheSmartHuman.com health education platform. “I counsel my patients with fibromyalgia or any kind of chronic pain not to push themselves too hard,” Dr. Cohen says. “Learn to say ‘no’ to events and requirements if you can get away with it and give your body an opportunity to rest.”
Sleep is especially important. She adds: “If you don’t get enough sleep, your perception of pain is often elevated regardless of health conditions, but because of the heightened sensitivities that can come with fibromyalgia, it’s especially important to get high-quality sleep, and a lot of it.”
Besides attending to lifestyle factors such as sleep and nutrition, there are treatments you can apply to cope with heightened sensory sensitivities. For instance, medications for fibromyalgia or migraine can also alleviate these symptoms.
Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) can be a powerful tool for coping with these symptoms by changing your thoughts and transforming your experiences.
Numbness and Tingling
Paresthesia, or a feeling of “pins and needles” — including tingling, burning and numbness — often accompanies neurological disorders, though the exact cause remains unclear. It is important to speak with a healthcare provider if you experience paresthesia because it could be caused by another condition like small fiber polyneuropathy.
How to Cope With Numbness and Tingling
Attending to your mental and emotional health, such as with meditation, deep breathing, and a mindfulness practice, can help you cope with paresthesia.
“The mind-body connection is very real,” says Cohen. “Go out for a walk in nature, turn off your technology, hang out with friends who make you laugh.”
Physical therapy and gentle exercise can also help, but be cautious. “Only do what is comfortable — if you overdo it, you’ll crash and burn,” warns Teitelbaum.
Headaches and Pain in the Jaw or Face
Fibromyalgia can render you more sensitive to headache triggers, including stress, sleep disruptions, and hypersensitivity to sensory input as described above.
Tension headaches, caused by muscle tension or stress, commonly accompany fibromyalgia. People with fibromyalgia also frequently live with migraine, as previously noted.
Temporomandibular disorders (TMD) — a group of conditions that cause pain and dysfunction in the jaw and surrounding tissues — can also accompany fibromyalgia.
How to Cope With Fibro Headaches
Stress management techniques can prevent or alleviate headaches associated with fibromyalgia. One such technique is progressive muscle relaxation, or PMR, which involves tensing and relaxing your muscles to induce a relaxation response.
For short-term pain relief, Teitelbaum recommends acetaminophen (Tylenol) and creams like Icy Hot or Tiger Balm.
Cognitive Issues (aka ‘Fibro Fog’)
Less rare than the previously mentioned symptoms, brain fog, or “fibro fog” as it is sometimes called, refers to difficulties with thinking and memory that can accompany fibromyalgia.
[3] “It’s important to distinguish between brain fog and something like dementia, particularly for elderly people,” Dr. Teitelbaum notes. “Brain fog is forgetting where you left the keys. Dementia is when you forget how to use the keys.”
Like heightened sensitivities, Teitelbaum says it results from trying to manage too much sensory input with too little energy. Cohen adds that there can be a closely linked emotional component: “When we’re overwhelmed, we can have a harder time pulling from memory and performing functional tasks.”
Persistent brain fog can make it difficult to perform work duties or enjoy social activities. Teitelbaum says it’s “very treatable.” One treatment he particularly recommends is chewable HRG80 Red Ginseng.
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Before relying on medical treatments, Teitelbaum advises attending to lifestyle factors, particularly sleep and nutrition. Strategies for organizing your tasks and time — learning to work at a comfortable pace, and using lists and other techniques to manage your work and life — can also be helpful.
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