The Fibromyalgia Programme is an extremely high concept, high insight, full range treatment programme for those suffering with problems on the fibromyalgia spectrum.

Fibromyalgia is much more than it superficially seems to be.  It is a highly deceptive condition which conceals its magnitude for years until those who treat it cannot conceive of its range and those who experience it cannot articulate its often hellish depths.

Be assured, it is the condition itself which is deceptive – not the sufferer.  Most of the time, it is extraordinarily difficult to articulate the experience of fibromyalgia.  As the word ‘war’ does not reflect the obvious havoc of being in a war – neither does the word ‘fibromyalgia’ reflect the experience of it.

With the years of experience, observing fibromyalgia in almost forensic detail, and with a greatly expanded perspective, Dr Downes can assert that the condition has more far reaching effects than is immediately apparent.  At all levels of fibromyalgia – appearances are highly deceptive, and so are the symptoms.  Complacency is cautioned against.

While pain, sleep disturbance and tiredness are the hallmarks of the syndrome, there is alas much more to it than that.  As we track through the last 20 years, it should be obvious that there are many symptoms which evade the neat confinement of a rheumatological condition. Indeed, there are many symptoms which evade the confinement of any present medical speciality.  Falling between stools becomes the daily exercise of the fibromyalgia sufferer. There is nowhere to go with the vast array of disconcerting and often embarrassing symptoms.  Hence the Fibromyalgia Programme.

Many sufferers cannot give voice to their experiences beyond saying that there head/back/neck etc. hurts, they are exhausted and have little duration or quality of sleep.  For the benefit of those marooned in the isolation chamber of your experience, I can share with you the following:

Little of what you experience is logical.
Most of what you experience has a concealed rationale.
All of it will resolve when order and power can be restored to the affected area.

Therefore, do not beat yourself up that you experience things which make no ‘sense’.  Do not beat up others whose world you do not understand.  You are not crazy because others do not understand.