Hello, I'm new.....

[Guest guest]

Hi to everyone! I am new to ALL of this so I apologize in advance

for this lengthy introduction, but I have NOBODY to discuss this

with that would understand. My name is Dena and I am a 36 year old

married mom of 3 (12, 10, 8). We live in Ohio. I was always a

thin, energetic, on-the-go person. During my pregnancies, I had

Graves disease (overactive thyroid) and it seems everything went

downhill from there. For the last 10 years, I've had a myriad of

sympotoms including kidney stones/flank pain, irregular/rapid

heartbeat with chest pain, mono and 5th disease in the same year,

IBS (I've had since age 16), ear stuffiness/pain/ringing, popping

jaw, frequent sore throats, very frequent headaches, facial pain,

muscle twitches/spasms/vibrations, interior knee pain on both sides,

irritability/mood swings/loss of patience, stiff upper

back/neck/shoulders (I'm constantly cracking everything to loosen it

up), extreme fatigue, waking mutliple times at night (although I

have NO trouble actually falling asleep), and right now I'm having

severe left hip/leg pain, and I'm hyper-sensitive to touch (if

someone pokes me, it feels like they hit me with a hammer). I've

gained 40 pounds over the last 8 years (20 in the last 2). I've had

every test you can imagine (x-rays, ultrasounds, echocardiagrams,

blood work, etc.....) and everything is always " normal " . FINALLY,

my doctor just announced that I most definitely have fibro after my

latest round of complete blood workup. Everything was normal except

my ANA was ever-so-slightly elevated. For now he started me on

30mg/day of Cymbalta however I can't take it yet because my

insurance company is giving me fits about authorizing it (Medical

Mutual). My doctor did not refer me to a rheumatologist but I'm

wondering if I should consider that. I have no idea what to do or

where to go from here. I'm going to order a book from Amazon and I

joined this group to hopefully get more help here than from the

doctor. So that's me in a nutshell. Thank you for letting me join

your group and again, sorry for such a long introduction!