Fibromyalgia and the Five Stages of Grief

When diagnosed with Fibromyalgia or any chronic illness, most people go through stages of coping that are very much like the five stages of grief.  As we face major changes to our lifestyles, most of us go through a time when we are saddened by the losses that these changes represent.  

Depending on the severity of your Fibromyalgia or other illness, you may need to give up doing things that you love, may no longer have the energy to live the life you had lived previously, may find yourself losing friends as you go through changes that are difficult for them to understand, and may need to completely change your life goals, hopes, and dreams to be more realistic and attainable.

Fibromyalgia is not a diagnosis of death.  However, it is a chronic syndrome that affects nearly every aspect of life.  I went through a stage of feeling overwhelming loss and frustration especially when I was first diagnosed and occasionally I feel the same way even now when I want to do something that I once did so easily, but am not able to do now.  

When this happens, I try to focus on positive thoughts and the things that I can do.  But it took a really long time for me to gain true acceptance, not only of my condition and the lifestyle changes, but of the fact that many of the people in my life are not capable of understanding what I’m truly going through and may never genuinely understand. 

I recognized several years ago that the feelings I was going through were very similar to the ones that I go through when someone I care about passes away.  The only difference for me was that unlike the feelings when someone dies, I also felt extremely guilty and selfish about feeling these things for myself.  After all, I am not dead, but the life I had before Fibromyalgia is dead.  And I needed to grieve for the losses that I suffered, so that I could move on and embrace my new life with Fibromyalgia.   

If you or a loved one has been recently diagnosed with Fibromyalgia, it may help you to know the five stages of grief and to recognize that part of coming to terms with the diagnosis and becoming successful in a new way is going to require going through these stages at some level.

Grieving Angel Statue

The Five Stages of Grief are:

Denial – This is a time period where you refuse to accept what is happening after diagnosis.  For me, I kept trying for years to maintain a full time job, raise the kids, and take care of the house. When things became difficult I just kept trucking along, until my body finally screamed at me that I needed to slow down and make some changes.  


If I had managed to get through the denial stage sooner, I probably would have been able to move on and actively take part in my medical journey sooner, instead of pretending it didn’t exist and hiding it from everyone as much as I could.

Anger - The second stage of grief, anger, is a big one.  This is the time period where you may feel angry about the diagnosis, may feel angry in general (but not be willing or possibly able to recognize why), and definitely wonder why this is happening to you.  


I have flashes of anger when I find myself too tired to do everything on my list for the day or when I am unable to go to an event that I was really looking forward to, but I’ve found that refocusing that anger into doing something productive and positive helps me so much more.

Bargaining – When going through the bargaining stage, people tend to focus on promising to do better if they get better, or try to develop a trade that results in being healthier.  Unfortunately, the only bargaining that works with Fibromyalgia is to take control as much as you can of your diet, exercise, attitude, and health care to ensure that you can make the most of each day. 

Depression - Depression is extremely common with a diagnosis of Fibromyalgia.  This is the phase where you don’t care anymore, basically give up, and stop trying.  Because we are dealing with such high levels of pain for such long periods of time with no guarantees about it getting better forever, most of us go through some level of depression (even if it isn’t diagnosed).  


After all, those of us dealing with Fibromyalgia and other chronic illness have to adjust our lives considerably while dealing with pain and other difficulties that can be managed, but is probably not going to go away.

Acceptance – If you reach the point where you are able to accept your condition, then you have reached acceptance. Once this has happened, you can finally move forward and find your new path with your condition.  If you are careful, you can even meet your previous life goals and achieve the same successes you once hoped to achieve.  We just need to be patient and recognize that these things may take longer than they would have before being diagnosed.

For me, once I finally managed to recognize and go through the five stages of grief, I ended up being much happier and productive.  It took me years to get through them and I genuinely hope that if you see yourself in this post that you concentrate some of your energy towards moving through these so that it doesn’t take you years as well. 

Sometimes, we will go through setbacks and may even end up repeating some of the stages of grief as we continue on our life journeys.  After all, we are all human; we all have emotions, and our feelings are valid. I think it is very important to recognize that setbacks occur in life, but if we can find the strength of mind to keep moving forward, then we have the best chances to achieve genuine happiness and have successful lives.