Every day in the run up to Christmas I’m going to talk about a symptom or side effect of fibromyalgia, to give some insight into what it’s like to live with the condition.

December 11th: Allodynia

Allodynia is when seemingly innocuous stimuli cause incredible pain. Temperature is a common trigger – the application of something slightly warm can feel like it’s burning the skin, for example. The barest amount of touch might as well be someone pressing down on a fresh bruise. It can be so severe that clothing becomes painful to wear.

Allodynia basically makes me feel as though I have one big bruise all over my body. People can’t gently nudge me any more without it feeling like they’ve full on punching me. If I slightly catch my arm or hip on a door handle the pain is so intense there’s always a few seconds where I’m convinced I’m going to be sick.

It’s an aspect that I’ve found people generally don’t “get”. Pain, fatigue, the anxiety and depression that go hand in hand with a chronic illness – these are all things that people can grasp as a concept, even if they don’t appreciate the severity. If someone leans on you and you yelp and flinch, there’s a lot of “but I barely touched you! That didn’t hurt!”

Spoiler alert: it does!