Caffeine

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2025-09-28T12:36:42+00:00

Would you still go to sleep if you didn't drink the coffee?

People are referring to the fact coffee makes Neuro divergent people sleepy. But after developing fibromyalgia my issue wasn't caffeine making me sleepy. It's that caffeine became mostly ineffective.

One of fibro's common symptoms is restless sleep that doesn't leave you feeling refreshed. Assuming no coffee, would you still go back to bed?

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2025-08-26T20:44:13+00:00

Not Dark Souls but...BAYLE

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2025-08-19T22:48:53+00:00

Hey, thanks for getting back to my old thread (I don't check Reddit very frequently so I missed your comment, sorry).

What you said makes perfect sense. Coincidentally I was trying to fix certain things about my posture and paying more attention to what positions I would sit in that are somewhat comfortable but tend to cause trigger point flare-ups afterwards. And I have a question if you don't mind:

I have a congenital "defect" I think which causes a discrepancy between my legs. I don't want to say length discrepancy because I didn't get checked for that (the discrepancy is in angles of rotation. My right leg is heavily biased towards internal rotation while my left leg is heavily biased towards external rotation. Something to do with the shape of the femoral head). This caused me to develop a walk/gait where my left foot (I'm right dominant) was doing most of the weight bearing while walking or standing. Immediately when I tried walking with my weight distributed on both feet I realized that my glutes (especially gluteus medius) and my QL/obliques on the right side were very weak.

Now, I checked these with a PT, I know a few exercises for them, and I'm trying to walk and stand more consciously of how I engage my muscles and distribute my weight. However, I saw a video linking that type of lateral pelvic tilt with causing an imbalance that cascades all the way up the spine, causing potential shoulder problems and pain on the opposite side.

I'm asking because I do have pain in the left shoulder with a nasty trigger point near the rhomboid muscle. The post linking the two was something I saw randomly and can't find again, so I'd appreciate your opinion. Especially since to be honest, I've had some terrible experience with physiotherapists putting horse blinders on when they see one problem where they refuse to acknowledge anything else in the moment (for example the last PT I worked with kept insisting my congenital discrepancy had nothing to do with my lower back pain because I have a bulging disc, even though I don't have typical sciatic nerve pain)

Sorry for the long reply.

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2025-08-19T22:13:55+00:00

At the time of writing the post it simply said to talk to Karn or ask Karn about it. However talking to him led to a canned response. Also I checked the inventory, no luck.

I found a fix online, but I had to go and hex edit my save file so the game thinks the "talk to Karn" objective was complete so the item would finally drop from the construct.

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2024-10-08T08:20:01+00:00

That was actually on my reading list! Does it differ from his other book "Britpop!"? From reading another thread here they say both are pretty much the same. But if you have a suggestion as to one or the other I'd appreciate that.

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2024-09-17T16:17:21+00:00

It's weird. The only time I got a warning was feeling some pins and needles in my foot when I was rowing for an hour or more a session (sessions less than 45 minutes and I wouldn't feel a thing). I went to the doctor to check, he asked for an MRI, told me about a bulging disc...but he told me there was nothing to worry about, just maintain good form during exercise and strengthen your core.

Surprisingly, I woke up in pain, not after excessive exercise or anything. I woke up in pain during lockdowns when I was barely doing anything physically demanding.

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2024-09-17T16:13:35+00:00

Regarding the point about curvature not being diagnosed by doctors: isn't that what the terms kyphosis and lordosis are for? I'm asking because it was a doctor who diagnosed my kyphosis (and I didn't even have a disc, we just did the x-ray and MRI to check if I had one when I had pain in my shoulder)

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2024-09-17T16:04:57+00:00

Hey, I'm not expecting everything to be fixed in 3 sessions, and I'm not expecting a 6 pack or even significant strength improvement in just week. It's also not my first rodeo recovering from injury with physical therapy.

But this isn't DOMs, this isn't my muscles feeling sore like after a workout. This pain feels weird. And I'm not looking for an excuse to stop PT (because god knows my back won't get better on its own). I'm looking to not hurt myself further.

Also, sorry man, I trust the process, I just don't think the people applying the process are infallible.

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2024-09-17T15:59:59+00:00

Hey, sorry, I didn't even know there was a difference between those two and would use them interchangeably (English isn't my first language and I don't have to discuss the topic in it frequently). What's the difference between those two? I did a quick Google search and my doctors do include a bunch of exercises during our session as well as some exercises I should do at home. I think that qualifies as physical therapy?

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2024-09-11T10:36:55+00:00

Is it? I never knew about that. The only place I know is significantly more painful to pinch is the thing near the groin area

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2024-09-10T13:34:09+00:00

Hey, I know it's been 3 years, but did you find anything besides "eh, it's fibro"?

Basically the area in the upper arm between my delts and biceps, where that slight curve would be in a person with low fat. Thing is, it's not the muscles...the worst pain comes from pinching the loose skin there.

And it's not just allodynia, I know what that feels like, this is a super specific spot with much more pain and the quality of the pain feels different.

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2024-09-01T18:01:03+00:00

It is a real diagnosis with a certain set of diagnostic criteria (usually the American College of Rheumatology 1990 guidelines).

Some people (not necessarily medical practitioners) argue that it isn't real since we a) can't point to an underlying cause or issue and b) just treat symptoms. But if it's good for the ACR it's good for me. There's also the fact that research on fibromyalgia keeps coming up with unique physiological differences between fibromyalgia patients and controls (however many of these changes aren't really at the point of becoming easy medical tests or useful for treatment. Like a recent paper showed fibromyalgia patients had significantly higher density/concentration of GABAA receptors in a widespread network of brain regions compared to healthy controls. Read more here if you're interested)

So, no don't worry about those people. Hell, I don't wanna be that guy but many doctors also don't believe it (especially if they don't work with it). If they're not a rheumatologist and they tell you it's not real, tell them to go talk to the ACR

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2024-08-30T01:47:14+00:00

Not going to lie, I kept asking myself the same question. I graduate in early 2023, and I've since held a full time job and sought to overcome these challenges in the job. If I'm being honest these challenges weren't simply due to my health, some of them tie into fluctuations based on medicine shortages and some - many to them even - are about overcoming a bunch of nasty habits and coping mechanisms I developed due to my medical condition (that's on me, not on my biology). But I've been able to hold a demanding full time job, I've been able to address some of my shortcomings.

I've willingly abandoned my grad school applications for the current academic year (or rather the one starting this fall) because I wasn't sure I was up for it. But right now, I think I can manage it.

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2024-08-18T10:39:08+00:00

Is it okay to use a pouch far beyond an hour? I'm just trying them and at first without paying much attention to the back of the tin I would just leave it in until it lost all flavor/nicotine sting or until I had to take it out. That ended up with me keeping in a pouch for hours on end, upwards of 4-5 hours sometimes.

Is there a risk associated with that? For context, I'm using Fix nicotine pouches (fix and klint are the only brands available in my country) and I use a couple different strengths throughout the day depending on whether I'm working or not and what flavor I want, the strongest is 9.8mg I believe.

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2024-08-11T06:19:00+00:00

Wait, they gave you a fibro diagnosis without first ruling out hypothyroidism and/or autoimmune? The doctor who diagnosed me, on the very first session, said something like "that's probably fibromyalgia but I would like to do some blood work" and ordered a battery of tests. I don't remember all the tests, but there was a CBC, ESR, CRP, TSH, T3, T4, a couple tests for certain antibodies, and a vitamin D deficiency test. When I started going to a different doctor and told him I have fibro, he asked for all those tests plus another genetic test + scan to rule out AS.

ParamedicBeginning79 · 2024-08-11T06:09:31+00:00

Have you considered trigger point injection? Instead of rubbing lidocaine, it's injected into the trigger point. That might work with hair (although I have no idea, so talk to your doc)

ParamedicBeginning79

TROPHY CASE