Do you remember the last time you had flu? The aches, pains, stiffness, headache, lethargy, disturbed sleep, inability to concentrate, discomfort and sheer unpleasantness of it?

Imagine having flu all the time (but without the fever and with the muscle pain as the strongest symptoms) - for months or years - and you have an idea of what fibromyalgia syndrome (FMS) can be like.

The Symptoms of Fibromyalgia and the Illnesses Associated with It

The commonest symptoms of fibromyalgia and conditions associated with it are:

• almost 100 per cent have muscular pain, aching and/or stiffness (especially in the morning)
• almost 100 per cent have fatigue and badly disturbed sleep
• almost 100 per cent can find that the symptoms are usually worse in cold or humid weather
• between 70 per cent al all (different studies have given different figures) sufferers have depression (though this is more likely to be a result of the muscular pain than be part of the cause
• 34 to 73 per cent have ittitable bowel syndrome
• 44 to 56 per cent have severe headaches
• 30 to 50 per cent have Raynaud’s phenomenon (hands go white an cold)
• 24 per cent suffer from anxiety
• 18 per cent have dry eyes and/or mouth (Sicca syndrome)
• 12 per cent have osteoarthritis
• 7 per cent have rheumatoid arthritis
• an as yet unidentified number of people with fibromyalgia have had silicone breast implant syndrome (SBIS) is now being defined
• between 3 and 6 per cent have substance (drugs and/or alcohol) abuse problems.

Other conditions extremely common among fibromyalgia sufferers include allergies, chromic rhinitis (an almost constantly runny nose), bruising easily, night cramps, restless leg syndrome, dizziness (sometimes caused by antidepressants medication taken to help the sleep problems experienced with fibromyalgia), sleep apnoea (when you breathing seems to stop while you are asleep), dry eyes and mouth, bruxism (teeth grinding), photophobia (extreme sensitivity to light), premenstrual syndrome, digestive disturbance, viral infections, Lyme disease (resulting from a tick bite), itchy skin - with or without a rash - loss of hair, sensitive bladder, mouth ulcers, generalized muscular stiffness, ‘foggy’ brain (difficulty in concentrating and poor short-term memory), dyslexia (wrong words come out or what is read is not understood), panic attacks, phobias, mood swings, irritability , a feeling of hands and feed being swollen without evidence of fluid retention. It has been noted, too, that commonly there is a history of injury - sometimes serious but often only minor - occurring within the year before the symptoms started.