Comments

1
It's also worth knowing that even back then we thought that Fibromyalgia had either an auto-immune or genetic component. Fisting couldn't cause it.
2
Fisting-induced... but how would you even...

Oy.
3
I wonder what he thought his grounds for a suit were. Lack of a warning label?
4
@3: 9-to-1 odds the letter-writer was female, FWIW. (Whatever your views on fibro's etiology/epidemiology are, it's not disputable that it's almost entirely a syndrome that affects women.)
5
I've spent most of my professional life in biomedical science, so I'm naturally skeptical of the kinds of hypochondriac associations people make.

Still, we are just beginning to learn about the enteric nervous system, sometimes called the "second brain." As with the new discoveries about far-reaching health implications of different sets of commensal microbes in the GI tract, it's worth keeping an open mind (along with scientific discipline).

But good luck trying to make a legal case about anything like this. Science (good science) is plodding and methodical, and the law (as we know from the marriage-equality struggle) is decades behind science as well as far more subject to rhetorical tricks in the courtroom.
6
Skidmarkalgia- the plankton that grows in tattered underwear that remains unwashed after being worn for several days after being fisted.

This could be a real concern. We need more Calgon! (Ancient Chinese Secret, huh???) Please pick up some brain bleach while you're shopping.
7
@6, you're not putting those Calgon Bath Oil Beads in my tub, mister. Leaves a ring you can't ever get all the way out.
8
@ 4, thanks.
9
@4, I know you are correct, but just for the record, I've known at least one man with fibromyalgia, so they do exist. Rare, but real.
10
Who does the LW want to sue?

I love that the spell checker says fibromyalgia isn't a real word (hypochondria, on the other hand, totally real).
11
I would love to see the faces of the jury in that trial.
12
@5: "As with the new discoveries about far-reaching health implications of different sets of commensal microbes in the GI tract, it's worth keeping an open mind"

I'd be much more amazed if anyone could demonstrate a causal factor, fisting or not.

Until that point, the person leaping to sue over something they don't understand doesn't instill a lot of confidence.
13
@12 - I can sort of understand the impulse. If my health were peachy keen all my life and then one day I was fisted and my life turned into a barely-functional clusterfuck of pain and fatigue and 400 other shitty symptoms, I might be angry enough to want someone to answer for it, too.
14
That's not to say that it's a rational impulse.
15
Obviously this particular letter writer doesn't have a case, but are their other instances of people winning personal-injury suits for damage incurred during consensual sex acts? Like, if you consented to be fisted, and your partner did something wrong and accidentally damaged you in some way, could you potentially win a case against them?
16
Does anyone know a personal injury attorney willing to take a case concerning fisting-induced arthritis?

Jesus Christ it hurts to type this.
17
Is it okay that I laugh when I read the comments? I mean, fibromyalgia sucks and all, but still life's funny.
18
You know, this suddenly strikes me as fake.
19
Tort reform anyone?
20
Maybe, but I think a faker would have wanted to include a lot of sordid details about when/where the fisting took place, and probably wouldn't have thought up the fibromyalgia thing--that's pretty left-field (or descending-colon).

I'm sticking with hypochondriacal association.

Someone (not me) could call all the personal-injury attorneys in Eugene and ask them about five years ago...

(and seandr made me laugh)
21
@14: Yeah, but I also don't support vaccine-autism suits either.

@19: No thank you, we've had enough of that disempowering bullshit.
22
I liked a local doc's approach - honesty. He told fibromyalgia patients that he didn't consider it a real disease. That approach demonstrably improved quality of life (his).

Having a reason for one's problems, getting attention, and powerful painkillers are all very addictive. And some things just go so well together: drinking, smoking & gambling; football, beer & nachos; victimhood, attention-seeking & oxycontin.
23
I want to be a fly on the wall of the attorney's office when he learns that his prospective client was the top.
24
If a condition consists of over 400 symptoms then I am assuming any Dr. can give a patient an answer when they visit instead of just saying "I don't know what you have" or "I am not sure what is going on". Doctors don't have to have an answer but in this age of people self diagnosing online and some demanding answers I am sure some Doctors are quite happy to have a a condition with 400 symptoms, it can be applied to so many unexplainable pains and is quite convenient and probably dissolves anxiety patients have that just demand some answer. We mix and take so many pills, have bad diets, don't exercise and expect some answer to our problems so fibromyalgia can be the perfect broad spectrum condition that can be applied to ease patient and doctors anxiety trying to explain what is going on.

Sometimes my internet connection is painfully slow or just drops and doesn't work at all. Perhaps when I call up my provider if they said my computer has fibromyalgia I might just go Oh OK!
25
@4: According to an old friend who became a hippy naturopath, that's because women are more in tune with their bodies.

You may well be suffering from fibromyalgia, but as a man, you're simply not sensitive enough to detect the symptoms.
26
@22: That doctor is guilty of malpractice. I'm a fibro patient, my pain is not in my head, and though I've taken the stronger opiates, they don't work well for most of us, me included.

@25: Fibromyalgia predominantly affects women because it's an autoimmune disease. Researchers have theories as to why autoimmune diseases are 3 to 1 more likely to affect women, but they don't know.
27
Some people with a fibromyalgia diagnosis might actually have a massive candida overgrowth, which doesn't necessarily look like a regular yeast infection at all. It's quite plausible that she got a candida problem after fisting, but not so likely that she got actual autoimmune fibromyalgia from sex.
28
Fibromyalgia is commonly thrown out by doctors when they don't know what's wrong, but why should that mean the patient gets accused of hypochondria?

I've been stuck with the fibromyalgia label for years until finding a diagnosis for a rare disease which causes the symptoms. Many will never find the root cause, or the issue which started the syndrome off. The suffering is real and the snark is pretty low - I've never understood why it's fun to laugh at people who are in a worse situation than you.
29
Since I'm the only one who used the word hypochondria in association with the LW, @28, I assume you're talking to me.

I didn't "accuse" the LW of hypochondria; it's brought up as a possible explanation for an otherwise highly improbable link—an association—the LW made between a single physical act and an ensuing cascade of symptoms.

I'm also not laughing or indulging in snark. The symptoms of fibromyalgia are real. I had a work colleague, a medical professional, whose career was severely limited because of them. It's a useful diagnosis for patients who need a diagnosis; it's less useful, as you suggest, when it causes patients and doctors to stop looking for other explanations.

Hypochondria is real too. My long-deceased grandmother felt guilty about sex all her life; when she developed a minor transient rash on her face in the mid-1980's, she was convinced she had AIDS. And no, I'm not "accusing" the LW of feeling guilty about sex.

Please don't take offense. None was intended.
30
One of the tests for fybromyalgia is sensitivity in a bunch of specific spots on the body. I once had a doctor grind his thumb, hard, on each of those spots, and when I reported that it hurt, he diagnosed fybromyalgia. Problem was, of course, that if he'd have poked any other random spots that hard, they would have hurt, too.
31
Any chance the LW meant (anal) fissures? Because that would at least make sense...
32
Do you sue a sock puppet for this?
33
Why does everyone assume it was the fistee and not the fister?
34
wait isn't that what the lawyer does to you? The cure is the cause. [cue snake eating its own tail]
35
This letter was so stupid, I got lupus.
36
@33,

Yes, I was wondering if this was like a repetitive motion injury.

Peace
37
@30 - Your doctor is an incompetent boob. The spots only need to be pressed very lightly. If you have FMS, it feels as though you have been hit by a hammer. Fucking hurts, and not because anyone pressed hard.

The drug with a goofy name is a godsend, btw. And it isn't a painkiller of any sort, but works on nerve pain - it was developed for shingles. Seems unlikely that a fake disease would respond that way to medication. I agree with 26, painkillers are not particularly effective, sadly.

The fisting connection is ridiculous, though ...
38
Yael @37:

"Seems unlikely that a fake disease would respond that way to medication."

Ever heard of placebos? They are powerful!

In patients with arthritic knees, the sham (= placebo) operation worked as well as the standard surgery. (Which just means, that the standard surgery is a placebo in itself.)

And why would patients with a fake disease (remember, the symptoms are real; just the label on the symptoms is disputed) respond differently to patients with a recognised disease?
39
@38 - Of course placebos can work, but generally speaking, studies are done on medications before the are approved for a particular use and these involve comparing efficacy with a placebo. If those patients taking the medication show greater improvement than the placebo, it is generally accepted that the medication actually has an effect.

There have been days where I have forgotten my Lyrica (I have to take it every 12 hours) and only when I start feeling really bad do I realize I've forgotten. I don't think a placebo effect would wear off if you've forgotten you didn't take the meds. It should just keep happily working until I realize I forgot a dose and only then I should start feeling worse.

I confess, I have no idea what you are talking about in your last paragraph.
40
My question is--who's suing? The fisted or the fister?
41
@15: The general rule in tort law is that consent is a defense. If the fistee consented, then they assumed the risks inherent in fisting, and the fister is not liable for either foreseeable harm or for negligence. If the injury was caused by something outside the scope of consent, or if the fister inflicted harm either recklessly or deliberately, then they may still be liable.

There is also a limit to what you can consent to -- rough sex that is very likely to lead to serious injury or death is not something you can validly consent to. The top will be liable if, for example, you let her nail your testicles to the wall, even if you'd filled out a signed, witnessed, and notarized consent form.

And there is also the criminal law to consider. State sexual assault statutes may have different mens rea and consent rules than tort law, and prosecutors can prosecute even if your sex partner doesn't want them to.
42
In a Rheumatology practice I know they evaluate patients with generalized pain, or with a previous diagnosis of Fibromyalgia. Some of them had it, other doesn´t. The ones that are diagnosed of Fibromyalgic syndrome (they like more this name because for them is the least innaccurate term o name what ever the patients has, even tough it can be call with other names like myalgic encephalomyelitis, which they believe it´s not accurate) are referred back to their primary care physicians.
They don´t treat patients with this disease. They have realized they can´t. Current medications are not that effective in the long term for most of the patients (even pregabalin...). They advised them if they want to try them, they can do it with their primary care physicians, but they also tell them to lower their expectations about those meds. They also advise the patient to do low impact aerobic exercise and to start cognitive behavioral therapy (they emphasized this, for them is the dual therapy is the closest thing to a treatment) It they have more emotional symptoms, they can also try antidepressants with their physician or a psychiatrist.

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