A recipe for... well, for fibro, because that's what this whole blog is about

Let's take two days of being awakened at around 130 in the morning by the dogs incessantly barking. At what? I don't know. It could have been anything. Someone knocking on the door. The neighbors coming home from work and slamming their car door. A car driving by with a deep, pounding bass beat. A car alarm a block away. A moth farting in the next county. You all have seen their ears. They could pick up Radio-Free Europe on those things.

On those days, I would get up, come downstairs and then stay up for a couple hours, till it was close enough to the time to take my morning stay-alive pills and then go back to bed. One of those days, I slammed a good solid three hour nap. The other day I had a three hour nap, but it was broken into short naps.

Let us mix in some random stressful moments. Some stress of the mental kind and some of the physical kind. They were quick, but they were enough to get my stress levels up. And of course, the subsequent drop of said stress. (except for the standing on my feet for over an hour- as opposed to standing on my hands. Hey, I know people who can do that, so it isn't exactly that far-fetched!).

And for fun, let us throw in a few happy moments of adrenaline. (most notably, my daughter leaving for her trip to New York City).

Now, if this recipe wasn't already delicious, let us sprinkle it over the top with a weather change. How much of a weather change? Well, we'd been rocking the low to mid-fifties for days (that's in Fahrenheit, kids). And it was humid. Which is bad enough. But, on Wednesday, we started out at a solid 43° in the early AM. By the time Ceej had to be at the school for her pre-trip baggage check (around 4 PM), it had dropped to 25° with a wind chill of 14°. And it was alternating between snow, sleet, rain and back to snow.

The first day was bad enough. I was tired. I was sore. But it was nothing new. The second day, I was exhausted and even a bit more sore. My joints ached as well. My muscles were pained, but my joints were a dull throbbing ache.

Today, which is the third day, but not exactly included because I didn't get woke up at 130 in the morning, I am so exhausted I can feel it to my bones. The physical tiredness, the mental stress has worn me down. The pain is everywhere. Everything hurts. My muscles are burning with pain. My feet are screaming in pain and the skin is hot to touch. I feel like my feet are on fire. My bones ache. My joints are a step above that "ache" and are included in that burning pain with my muscles. The bones in my feet feel like they're trying to escape through my skin. Oh, and my skin... yeah, itching. Itching like an addict going through detox. But the itching isn't enough. Whatever touches my skin is causing what's under it to hurt. My shirt across my shoulders? Yup. The waistband on my yoga pants? Yup. The chair on my ass and thighs? Definitely. The foam pad thingy I rest my wrists on to type? You already know the answer.

I can't even rub my hands together in an effort to ease the pain or release the tension. I keep forgetting and I interlace my fingers and grasp... only to break a speed record separating them. I have some lovely and understanding online friends and they offer virtual hugs and the very thought of being hugged right now makes me cringe. How much would that hurt me?

Vicodin hasn't touched it. (I'm almost three hours into the Vicodin). I'm two weeks away from a follow-up with my fibro doctor and I don't know how well this is going to go. I can't say whether this is a medicine failure or if it's just a flareup. The problem is the weather. Springtime weather changes just thrown in on top of a cocktail of other triggers. I can say that I'm exhausted to the bone. Have you ever built a fence? Dug post holes? That's how I feel. And there is no fence around my house to indicate that I've worked hard at all. That isn't fair. If I'm going to hurt this much, there should at least be something worthwhile to look at, right?

This recipe isn't very tasty at all. I think we should fire the chef.