As you live with and learn about Fibromyalgia, figure out what's important to know and what is of no consequence. With knowledge about such things as diet, sleep, supplements, the amount of exercise and stretching that's best for you, the activities that you can participate in without increasing symptoms, etc., you'll be further ahead because you won't be doing things to naturally aggravate your body.

Know that:

• It's good to stay as active as possible. Your muscles won't atrophy and you body won't automatically decondition. When you get a symptom break, you won't be spending your time trying to get back up to par.
• It's good to get a proper amount of sleep, including maintaining a normal sleep pattern, staying up during the day, sleeping at night.
• It's good to figure out which foods work best for you and which ones you need to cut out. This may mean eliminating white flour, sugar, caffeine, etc., from your diet. Other people do poorly by consuming Aspartame or Nutrasweet. Some get a big spike in symptoms after eating foods made with MSG, monosodium glutamate. Learn what's best for you and begin to readjust your diet.

Extra hint: You may want to check out a previous edition of the Health Matters Show about the benefits of undertaking a full blown elimination diet, http://www.remember.org/mt/mt-tb.cgi/4188

And one more thing to note concerns the traumas and events of your life that 'could have affected' you and probably still are.

Even as babies in the womb, human beings soak up the energies and emotions of people in the outside world (outside the womb). They hear the voices and react to the people in their little lives.

Whether we're growing up or adults, we function as sponges. Because of cellular memory, we human beings record everything. Input goes into us and becomes part of our bodies and psyches, whether we realize it or not. All of this data and all of our experiences have the potential to alter every system in our body. This is amazing when you consider the billions of pieces of information that you have encountered in your lifetime.

Think about all of your life experiences as you work at surviving Fibromyalgia.

If you're smart, you'll decide what you can do about (and to change) the 'memories' that are impacting you and how you'll stop letting them negatively affect your life and health once and for all.

This is your journey and you have the power to alter the course you take.

Thanks for hanging around for all 3 segments of this issue. Write a post and let us know how you're doing. Fibromyalgia is not an easy road to travel and those of us who hang in there for the long haul deserve to feel better!

I wish you great and improving health,
Cinda Crawford, host of the Health Matters Show