RA and Fibromyalgia???

Hi, yes I have RA and Fibromyalgia. I take Prednisone, Methotrexate, Enbrel and Melocicam for my RA and For the Fibromyalgia I take Cymbalta and Lyrica. Last Year I took Neurontin 3200 mg a day. It did not help. I was still in so much pain. My body was burning like I was on fire. Now it is somewhat better. I still have some burning but not as bad. I wish you well. inurgo

There are quite a few people on this site who have the combination of RA and fibromyalgia - I'm one of them. Lisa Emrich, one of our experts, recently wrote a post about living with RA and fibromyalgia and you can also check out the fibromyalgia area of our Chronic Pain site.  I have been on Enbrel (am now on Humira) and although I tried Neurontin, cyclobenzaprine works better for me.  if Neurontin ends up not working well for you, try Lyrica.

It may take a while to figure out how to balance the various coping techniques for RA and fibromyalgia - what helps one tends to make the other worse.  E.g., fibromyalgia likes to move - I twitch a lot and tend not to do any one thing for longer than 20-30 minutes, then  do something else. The longer you sit still, the more you stiffen up.  meditation and relaxation an essential part of keeping the fibro down to a dull roar and I can highly recommend gentleness of exercise like tai chi or yoga that are a sort of meditation in motion.  Keeping warm is also crucial - if I get a draft, all my muscles tense up.

You may want to try writing a SharePost when you're up to it - they tend to get more traffic than individual questions in this area and may help you connect with our other users who live with both of these conditions.

One last thing. Some people find that Enbrel increases the muscle tension/spasms of fibromyalgia.  Hopefully, you won't be one of them, but if you do end up finding that although Enbrel works for your RA, it aggravates your fibro, I can highly recommend trying Humira. I do get a bit of muscle pain for a day or two after my shot, but it simmers down quickly and as an added benefit, one of the side effects of Humira is "warmth" which works a wonderfully well for my fibro pain.