By Mary Ann Dunkel, Guest Columnist

Fibromyalgia stole my life more than 28 years ago. I have severe chronic pain and fatigue that limits my activities of daily living. Unless you have experienced unrelenting severe pain 24 hours a day, you cannot know the horror of it.

I have been prescribed more pharmaceuticals than I can remember and suffered damaging side effects from them. I've participated in psychotherapy, aqua therapy, multiple pain management programs, acupuncture and hypnosis. None of these modalities brought me relief and for quite some time I was bedridden and dependent on family for care.

My doctors have prescribed me morphine, fentanyl, oxycodone, tramadol and other medications to control the pain. None of them worked for very long and I could see these prescriptions were going to lead to addiction. Often, I weaned myself off them and suffered through terrible withdrawal because the small amount of relief they gave was not worth the risk of addiction or overdose death. Bottom line is these narcotics were not effective in treating my chronic pain.