For the last 17 years I have had a constant travelling companion on my journey through life. I don’t like him very much as he tends to get in the way a lot of the time and stops me from doing the things I love the most; spending quality time with my lovely wife and of course writing. What’s worse is that I’m addicted to both of those things so when my travelling companion raises his butt-ugly head for a sneer and to pull the rug from under my feet I get rather narked. His name? Fibromyalgia.

If you haven’t heard of fibromyalgia I’ll give you a quick medical lesson. It’s a common bedfellow of M.E and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome whereby it leaves you exhausted after very little exertion but it also comes with the added bonus of tremendous pain in the neck, shoulders, back, arms and legs. In addition he also brings on the most horrendous brain fog imaginable and terrible restless leg syndrome. A horrible little toe-rag he is but I’m stuck with him.

For example: I started my new novel The Ph… oops, almost gave the title away there; ahem, my new novel, on the 14^th July last year. Now considering that I want to write Monday to Friday and that my average daily word count is about 2000 words (all I can do really) then the first draft should have been finished by the end of September at the latest. And yet, here we are, into February 2021 and I’ve only just finished it. And the reason it has taken so long is my fiend Fibro (see what I did there?) keeps getting in my way and stopping me for lengthy spells.

Fibro first came into my life following a severe viral infection in 2003. Long story short; the virus nearly killed me and messed up my heart, my brain and left me with a generous dose of the aforementioned muscle condition. Over the years Fibro has varied in intensity. At times I’ve been able to hold down a job for a short while. At others I’ve been bed-ridden for days on end with little strength, no energy and in quite the most remarkable pain. He never lets up though. Even on a ‘good’ day or when I’ve been working he’s always there in the background gnawing away at me with his diamond tipped teeth.

I’ll say just one good thing for him though. He’s taught me patience and the ability to just let things go and pick them up at a later date. There was a time when I would have hated the thought of doing virtually nothing during the course of a whole day. Now, I’ve learned to be at peace, to accept my lot and look forward to tomorrow when, hopefully, he’ll go a bit easier with me. The b*****d!