For years, fibromyalgia has been largely ignored or written off by the medical community. It’s only recently that it’s gotten enough validation as a real diagnosis to merit a single pharmaceutical prescription (Lyrica, aka Pregabalin). I’ve spoken with many people who had fibromyalgia (be it self-diagnosis through research, trial and error, or an official diagnosis), and many doctors simply shrugged and suggested they take ibuprofen or talk to someone at a pain management clinic. This has compelled many fibromyalgia patients to try a myriad of dietary supplements as a form of symptom relief.
Here’s where i make my disclaimer: we are not licensed medical practitioners, and we can not and will not recommend that anyone personally try anything listed on this page. We are simply listing and reviewing the things we have experimented with over the years and giving information about what we have found to be helpful.
I also want to note that “dietary supplements” are only kinda-sorta regulated by the FDA. To quote Wikipedia’s entry on dietary supplements:
“Unlike pharmaceutical companies, supplement manufacturers are not required to prove the safety or effectiveness of their products; the FDA can take action only after a dietary supplement has been proven harmful. In addition, the purity and quality of individual brands of dietary supplements are unregulated.”
What does this mean? It means that when you go to a store that carries or specializes in supplements, the products themselves will most likely not have any written information on what the product is supposed to do or supposed to be used for. To be blunt: do your research before you go to the store. Honestly, i recommend doing this with prescriptions as well – it was that research that saved me from an injection that one doctor wanted to give me… that i found out on my own accord had some potentially devastating and long-lasting effects.
It also means that the brand matters; i cannot stress this enough, and will in fact repeat this many times throughout this article. You will get sick of me saying this. Some manufacturers produce better quality products than others. If you’ve heard a dozen people swear by a specific supplement, ask them which brand they’re using.
Oh, and always always always (did i mention always?) start out taking any supplement as the per the recommendations on the container it came in – maybe even less than that. Some things you want to work up to.
When in doubt, check it out on Google or Wikipedia, but be wary of sites that are selling something. Definitely check multiple resources to make sure their analyses and recommendations match up.
All that said and done, here’s a list of what we’ve tried over the years, in no specific order (but as we try more things, they will be added to the bottom of this page). And again: this is just what has and has not worked for me. Should you attempt similar experimentations, your mileage may vary.
Subpages: