Fibromyalgia Podcast®

As a master Certified Fibromyalgia Coach®, author, and fibro podcaster, the questions I'm asked more than any others are: How do I get better? How do I improve my Fibromyalgia so I can get back to living the life I want to live? While those sound like simple questions, they do not have simple answers. We all have similar symptoms, what helps you feel better may not be the thing that helps me feel better. We all have to find our own magic formula for what makes us feel best. I know from personal experience just how overwhelming it can be to find that formula on your own. That's why I created a training program in 2015 that would teach people just like you how to improve their own Fibromyalgia, and how to help others do the same. In this first episode of a special series where I'll be answering a lot of questions I get about our Certified Fibromyalgia Advisor® class and about becoming a Certified Fibromyalgia Coach®, I want to start super basic. We're going over what a Certified Fibromyalgia Coach® is, how that's different from a Certified Fibromyalgia Advisor®, why you should consider the Advisor class if you're a patient who just wants to feel better, who else the Advisor class is perfect for, what the certification aspect really means, the staggering statistics on how many participants see significant improvements in their symptoms by the end of the Advisor class.       Note: This episode is not meant to be medical advice. Every person and every situation is unique. The information you learn in this episode should be shared and discussed with your own healthcare providers. Join us at our next Virtual Open House! Tami will answer the top six questions about our classes. Learn the differences between our Advisor and Coach training paths, and uncover which one is right for you. Discover our tuition and payment options, and how our classes are tailored for fibro brains and bodies. Register for the FREE event here. Don't like waiting? Get the full Be A Coach series NOW! Register to access the complete 'Be A Coach' series, along with several bonus episodes, delivered straight to your favorite podcast app. Use this link to sign up for FREE. Interested in hearing from our alumni about their journey in our courses? Register to receive our complimentary 'Fibromyalgia Stories of Hope' collection, automatically delivered to your favorite podcast app. Use this link to subscribe. Use this link to subscribe. For daily doses of hope, inspiration, and practical advice, join Tami on Facebook or Instagram. Need a good book to read? Download Tami's books for free. Ready to take back control of your life and health? Schedule a consultation with a Certified Fibromyalgia Coach®.

"Fibromyalgia patients have lived with, 'Well, it's nothing. We're giving you nothing, and don't come back.' We're not doing that anymore." - Dr. Andrew Holman Living with fibromyalgia, you know what it feels like to live in a body that never really settles down. Even when we're resting, there's a background tension that doesn't fully release. Sleep doesn't restore us the way it should, stress lingers longer than it seems to for other people, and pain feels louder than it should. It's exhausting feeling like your nervous system is always braced for impact, even on the days when you're doing everything "right." This constant feeling of being on edge isn't about mindset or resilience. It's about how our nervous system has learned to respond over time. When your body stays stuck in fight-or-flight, it interferes with the deep, restorative sleep you need and amplifies pain and sensitivity throughout the day. That's why getting a deeper understanding of how your nervous system is reacting and supporting it to move away from the fight-or-flight state is often a significant piece of the puzzle in managing your fibro symptoms. Today, Tami is joined by Dr. Andrew Holman, a board-certified rheumatologist with decades of experience working with fibromyalgia patients. Dr. Holman is the co-founder of Inmedix and has spent years studying how stress biology and autonomic nervous system imbalance affect pain, sleep, and healing. In this conversation, Tami and Dr. Holman discuss Dr Holman's clinical observations on fibromyalgia, patterns he noticed over decades treating patients with fibromyalgia, why heart rate variability (HRV) matters, his response to skepticism about fibromyalgia, his perspective on the question of whether fibromyalgia is autoimmune, how sleep deprivation can drive symptoms, why deep restorative sleep matters for pain and cognition, how the autonomic nervous system affects your body, what HRV measures and why it's a useful window into the stress response, how newer HRV tech aims to separate sympathetic and parasympathetic activity more precisely, using HRV and resting heart rate to spot overexertion and help pace activity, what clinical outcomes can look like when autonomic balance improves, HRV as a potential missing vital sign, the usefulness of HRV data for guiding more individualized treatment decisions, autonomic medicine as a growing frontier, practical steps you can take to better support your nervous system, the critical link between sleep apnea and fibromyalgia, addressing comorbidities that may be contributing to your symptoms, cervical cord compression as a possible contributor to autonomic dysfunction, why tenderness matters in diagnosis, where Dr. Holman's new HRV tech is in the rollout process, what he sees for the future of fibromyalgia research, and more.     Note: This episode is not meant to be medical advice. Every person and every situation is unique. The information you learn in this episode should be shared and discussed with your own healthcare providers. To learn more about the resources mentioned in this episode, visit the show notes. For daily doses of hope, inspiration, and practical advice, join Tami on Facebook or Instagram. Need a good book to read? Download Tami's books for free. Ready to take back control of your life and health? Schedule a complimentary consultation with a Certified Fibromyalgia Coach®.

"Fibromyalgia can completely break your relationship with yourself when your symptoms are unpredictable." Tami Stackelhouse For many of us with fibromyalgia, goal setting doesn't just feel hard. It feels painful. You make a plan on a good day, only to wake up the next morning in pain or exhausted, and suddenly everything falls apart. After that happens enough times, it stops feeling like bad luck and starts to feel personal. You start doubting your body, your brain, and eventually yourself. This is not a character flaw. It's a natural response to living in a body that changes the rules without warning. Traditional goal setting assumes predictable energy, consistent capacity, and stable days; things that fibromyalgia simply does not offer. Instead of trying to force ourselves into systems that don't fit, we need tools that are designed for fibro bodies in the first place. In this episode, Tami shares a completely different approach to goal setting that actually works with fibromyalgia instead of against it. She talks about why starting small is essential when living with fibromyalgia, how managing unpredictable symptoms can slowly erode self trust, why traditional goal setting often fails for fibro bodies, the ferocious turtle metaphor and why steady progress works, why slow is smooth and smooth is fast when managing flares, making goals easier to climb by using small, close rungs, reducing overwhelm and prevent push crash cycles, focusing on rebuilding self trust, not pushing harder, what it really means to set stupidly small goals, how tiny wins rewire the brain, adapting SMART goals so they actually work with fibromyalgia, why flexibility matters, turning SMART goals into SMARTER goals, why awareness is often the first and most important goal, a simple five-step system for setting fibro friendly goals, choosing one small thing and adjusting as you go, how consistent tiny wins rebuild self trust over time, embracing the ferocious turtle mindset, trusting small steps forward, and more. A gentler, more realistic approach to your goals can help you rebuild your confidence and take small steps forward. Remember: slow, steady progress really does count.     Note: This episode is not meant to be medical advice. Every person and every situation is unique. The information you learn in this episode should be shared and discussed with your own healthcare providers. To learn more about the resources mentioned in this episode, visit the show notes. For daily doses of hope, inspiration, and practical advice, join Tami on Facebook or Instagram. Need a good book to read? Download Tami's books for free. Ready to take back control of your life and health? Schedule a complimentary consultation with a Certified Fibromyalgia Coach®.

"The general public and even health professionals are not fully aware of the power of our circadian rhythms." - Dr. Leon Lack If you've ever felt tired, foggy, and flared up when the seasons or the clocks change, you are not alone. Light is one of the most powerful signals to the brain, and when your body's internal clock, your circadian rhythm, becomes disrupted, that can influence your energy, pain levels, mood, and focus. For those of us already living with fibro's sensitive nervous system, even small shifts in daylight can have a significant impact. Understanding your circadian rhythm can help you find balance with your energy, sleep quality, and other fibro symptoms. Morning light, evening routines, timing your wake-up, and even the type of light you're exposed to all influence how your body functions. When you understand how they all work together, light can become one of the simplest and most effective fibro-friendly tools for improving sleep, stabilizing your mood, and boosting your energy all year. Today, Tami is excited to be joined by Professor Leon Lack, one of the world's leading experts on sleep, circadian rhythm, and light therapy, to talk about why light affects us so deeply  and how light therapy can support you. Dr. Lack is also the co-inventor of the Re-Timer light therapy glasses, one of Tami's favorite things for 2025. In this conversation, they discuss what a circadian rhythm is, how it drives daily sleep and wake patterns, how light exposure shifts the body clock, the effects of social jetlag, inconsistent schedules, and sleep debt on mood, alertness, and pain, why some people are true evening types with delayed sleep phase challenges, how strategies like Tami's Lights Out Sundays can help reset body timing, what studies show about how natural light rapidly resets sleep, why morning light timing matters, how to identify your circadian low point to shift your rhythm more effectively, how light therapy works in cloudy or low-sunlight regions, the evolution from early light boxes to modern wearable devices, how light entering the eyes resets the brain's clock, Tami's experience using Re-Timer glasses, which wavelengths are most effective for shifting the body clock, why consistent morning light matters most, practical steps for shifting your sleep earlier, how winter darkness worsens mood and sleep, why jetlag adjustment varies from person to person, strategies for travel recovery, how evening light therapy can help early risers sleep later, best practices if you tend to sleep in, the risks of driving during circadian lows, why shift work remains so dangerous, and more.   Note: This episode is not meant to be medical advice. Every person and every situation is unique. The information you learn in this episode should be shared and discussed with your own healthcare providers. To learn more about the resources mentioned in this episode, visit the show notes. For daily doses of hope, inspiration, and practical advice, join Tami on Facebook or Instagram. Need a good book to read? Download Tami's books for free. Ready to take back control of your life and health? Schedule a complimentary consultation with a Certified Fibromyalgia Coach®.

"Fibromyalgia can take a lot from us, but it doesn't have to take everything." - Tami Stackelhouse One of the hardest parts of living with fibromyalgia is how much joy can quietly disappear from your life. Activities you used to love start feeling out of reach and even simple things like going out with friends or spending time on a hobby can feel too draining. Over time, it's easy to lose sight of what brings you happiness when most of your energy is going toward managing your pain and getting through the day. But joy is not something you "earn" once you feel better. Joy is part of what helps you feel better. It plays an essential role in calming your nervous system, lowering pain levels, and helping your body shift out of constant survival mode. When fibromyalgia makes your world smaller, joy often feels like the first thing to go, but it's actually one of the most powerful tools you have for healing. The good news is that joy doesn't need to be big or complicated. It just needs to be intentional. In this episode, Tami walks you through her Joy List exercise, a simple and meaningful practice to help you identify personal sources of joy. She talks about how fibromyalgia can lead to a loss of hobbies, work, and social connection, the emotional weight that follows these changes, the biology of joy, how dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin support pain relief and healing, three reflective questions to help you rediscover what brings happiness and meaning, practical tips for creating your Joy List, why certain activities bring joy and how to adapt them in new ways, accepting that joy may look different now and that change is part of healing, focusing on the feeling of joy rather than trying to recreate past experiences, finding new forms of joy through creativity and flexibility, six simple ways to add joy into your daily life, reframing your understanding of joy as a muscle, why reconnecting with joy is crucial for managing fibromyalgia, why now is the best time to start or revisit your personal joy list, supportive resources you can utilize on your journey of rediscovering joy, knowing when to seek help from a coach or community, and more. Remember, the parts of you that feel lost are still there, waiting for you to reach for them again.     Note: This episode is not meant to be medical advice. Every person and every situation is unique. The information you learn in this episode should be shared and discussed with your own healthcare providers. To learn more about the resources mentioned in this episode, visit the show notes. For daily doses of hope, inspiration, and practical advice, join Tami on Facebook or Instagram. Need a good book to read? Download Tami's books for free. Ready to take back control of your life and health? Schedule a complimentary consultation with a Certified Fibromyalgia Coach®.