Listen to the story of a remarkable woman who struggled with fibromyalgia.
Despite constant cold exposure, and hostile bullying from coworkers, she persisted and found her internal power.
Transcript:
hi I'm here talking to dr. Andrew miles
the author of the fibro Bible dr. miles
you know you've said the average person
goes through the program they can
graduate one stage every two to three
weeks or so and that's kind of the
best-case scenario if they're really
doing their exercises and sticking with
it and also if they are able to mitigate
their stresses and not not have to deal
with a lot of extra things that are
gonna backtrack their progress but can
you tell us a little bit about somebody
who's gone through and you know maybe
has taken a lot longer due to you know
some sort of challenges that are you
know coming at him and sabotaging their
progress absolutely you know um it's fun
sometimes to look at the cases like I
had a nurse go through the complete
program in two weeks she was done she's
happy she's on with her life and treated
in five boroughs herself using this
protocols however we have to understand
that the person in two weeks is going to
be balanced by the person who took a
year to a year and a half and maybe the
average is about three months but there
are outliers both ways and we
responsibly can't just you know show you
though you know the three and a hundred
people who are better in a week or two
because that's not realistic and that's
not truthful so I'm gonna take you
through a case of a woman who took about
a year year-and-a-half and why it took
her this long so we started with the
immune system and this is where it was
challenging because this particular
woman she's she's bright she does her
stuff she's been very enjoyable to work
with and she worked at a particular
business that had an air-conditioning
vent right over her head and it was
blowing cold air every day and no matter
what kind of progress she made every
time she went to work she came back home
with fresh pain so as though she was
starting over everything every single
day now for outsiders looking in move
your desk get another job for her at
this time she was in such a state of
weakness that that was out of the
questions standing up for herself was
out of the question she was in a pattern
of just taking it to make matters worse
there were women in her office who
picked up on her weakness because of
this and would deliberately turn up the
air conditioning just to torture her Wow
they didn't understand they thought her
illness was fake and they liked the idea
that it would bother her but she didn't
have the personality type to appear
bothered more her whole her shoulders
were just drew I think as Maya Angelou
said like teardrops and that's horrible
because when people get into these
weakened states you would think that
those around them would you know would
rise and help them out a little bit but
that's not always the case with human
nature people can be absolute savages
and the way they were treating her was
was horrible and ultimately that was her
uphill battle but she did it and it took
longer as a result of this uphill battle
so we worked on the immune system we
worked on that constant neck pain she
was told by a chiropractor that her neck
was out of place and that was why her
neck was always weird I felt nothing to
indicate this I saw no evidence of this
whatsoever
I had an MD who specialized in
orthopedics give a second opinion on
this he said it was absolute garbage
what was actually happening is the
tightness around the neck was because of
the lymphatic fluid and the effect that
that was having on the muscles and it
was that temperature change that was
affecting so she would come in about
once a week which that isn't necessarily
enough for people if they're getting
treatment actively but in the beginning
the progress was slow she would come in
we would get the pain down she would go
back to work and the pain would spike
back up and I believe this is a
combination of being in a hostile work
environment and also
in a hostile work environment in terms
of socially having people try to bully
you is a hostile environment and then
having this cold air blasting on their
neck in an otherwise warm environment so
this is in a very warm environment but
you would get into the bank where she
worked and it would be a very quick
transition between warm to cold so as a
result she was doing her exercises she
would just constantly be going back to
stage one back to stage one and then we
would get through stage one and then
stew and everything's going great the
stomach's doing better we're getting
through stage three we're working on the
effect of stress on the body she's
having some wonderful resets pain is
dropping everything's getting stronger
especially over a two-week vacation back
to work back to stage one
it was just disheartening we talked
about boundary setting but here's the
thing you can read a book on boundary
setting but that stuff happens
subconsciously and unless it's your body
strengthening and just opening it up you
don't set your micro-expressions in your
face the timing you can't fake that
stuff and as humans we pick up on each
other's relative strength and weakness
and some people just get chicken pecked
because they're in a weakened state and
and then that would happen so it was you
know up two steps down one and a half
but over this time she gradually got
stronger and stronger in spite of all of
these setbacks in spite of you know if I
had my way to just wave a magic wand you
know I would probably kill a couple of
her co-workers you know shut off the AC
and then that would be it she could get
better move her desk whatever needed to
happen but it just I don't have that
power and if she didn't have that
personal power at that time to do so so
it turned out that by taking this really
long road she was able to get it to
where she would feel okay she would feel
the pain coming on go into the next room
do her exercise and by this time she was
getting enough internal ability she was
getting enough
efficiency in her system that she could
take out the pain right away and nip it
in the bud so then she wouldn't have
that huge pain spike and that gave her
quite a bit of confidence in the
workplace so that people stopped picking
on her that was just the first stage
wasn't able to move her desk wasn't able
to change the external environment but
having the confidence that she could
take control of her brain fog and that
pain that spikes with temperature
boosted her confidence and enough to
take some of that bullying away over
time that got stronger and stronger we
moved progressively through the stages
and now she basically is completely
graduated we work on more advanced
training because at this point she's
getting stronger than your average
person she can do some of the exercises
more as we see with athletes than as
somebody who was in a state of
fibromyalgia before her energy levels
are up she's getting activity and now
incredibly the air conditioning and the
temperature change it doesn't bother her
if it does it's very minor and she knows
exactly what to do and she doesn't even
have to go to the next room to do the
exercises she has such physiological
control that she can by breathing and
thinking and warm the back of her neck
and alleviate the pain symptoms so it's
not about necessarily making everything
perfect in your life sometimes it's
about learning to strengthen yourself
and adapt now the more control you have
over your environment in the beginning
that can make it very easy for people to
get through quickly but life isn't
perfect and some of us are dealt a bad
deck some of us don't have the kind of
social options to just bounce to another
job but even in those cases that look
impossible by taking the stage by stage
and understanding that this program is
developed for an imperfect garbage life
you know how much fibromyalgia is
associated with you know early childhood
you know trauma depression as well being
in this weakened state it says people
it's some pretty decent disadvantages
that's why we have to do our best to
become resilient in that moment to see
how many of the
types we can lower ourselves within a
given day that's when it gets back into
people's hands so when we say okay
people have had fibromyalgia you know
they don't that's true and if and when
some very small changes in temperatures
start to kick that back up they have the
skills themselves to nip it in the bud
they can call me and ask for advice you
know on how to get even stronger that's
what we do but they no longer need to
come in for a treatment they're not
dependent on anybody else it's all in
their hands and that's what's beautiful
because then they're able to help
themselves and help other people so
that's exactly with with this young
woman exactly what she did was she was
able to strengthen herself and take that
knowledge into her own hands so that now
she can live an imperfect life she can
eat the wrong foods she can be exposed
to that stupid air conditioner and it's
okay
she can still navigate through life she
can enjoy a happy life in spite of these
things because she's learned to have the
inner strength and the techniques and
the abilities to transcend them that's a
great case it's not the fastest case but
you know we look at the averages and we
work with people exactly where they're
at yeah you know and everybody's got
their challenges so it's really nice to
see somebody going through that with the
odds stacked against her and she still
managed to go internal and find her
freedom that way that's one the other
aspect that I'll say is you know of
course I would never mention her name
without permission was that I don't get
the impression that her family was very
supportive of of any of this and
sometimes we have odd family dynamics I
don't know if this is the case with her
but just saying generally there are
cases where people have family dynamics
where the family maybe want somebody to
be weak and maybe they're kind of the
person that gets bullied or scapegoated
in the family and it's not uncommon to
see the family members try to sabotage
the individual of fibromyalgia and
chronic fatigue to get into a state of
strength and as they're getting stronger
the ability for people to bully them
goes away and so when you have poor
social support from work when you have
poor social support at home that is I
think even worse than having an
air-conditioner or massive changes in
the weather that is probably the biggest
challenge that we see great thank you so
much thank you
