What Next - Joint Problems

[Guest guest]

HI;

I'm 31 now and have had joint & muscle pain for many years. About 6

years ago, I was diagnosed with FM and told that I like have some OA.

Though they didn't see anything on the bone scan or MRI at the time,

the scans were done a little after the first diagnosis, around 2006.

I've had a positive ANA 1:640 on multiple tests, though other lab

tests have not reveled anything significant.

About 3-4 years ago, I started 400mg a day of plaquinel to see if it

helped anything. I think it made my joints maybe a little better, but

it defiantly made my muscle pain much less. The doctor could not

explain why it would help with that, but we even did a trial of about

6 months off of it, and the muscle pain came back (bad cramping pain

in calf muscles all the time). Then within 6 weeks to 2 months of

going back on it, it was helping again, so I have stayed on it. When

I first saw my rheumy, my muscle pain was much worse than my joint

pain, now my joint pain is far and away the worst problem. I did have

a fair amount of knee pain in the past, that has gotten moderately

better, though, that might be due to the PT that I did.

I have tried just about all of the typical FM meds, and either had a

bad reaction to many or found them to not be very helpful. Though I

feel that I gave many of them a fair try staying on some for 1/2 a

year. I'm currently taking and tolerating fairly well Wellbutrin,

though I have gained around 15 pounds since starting it, I find it

more helpful for mood than anything else. None of them seem to do

anything meaningful for joint pain, Naproxen is the only thing that

really seems to help. Sometimes (pretty rarely) I have to take

predisone for asthma or for migraines and that helps my joints also.

I find that Naproxen 500mg twice a day is required to function, with a

3rd dose at times, this is a lot of Naproxen, but it is as prescribed.

I take one of the common pain meds with some tylenol in it, I find it

most helpful for sleep and when I am having a really hard time in the

day, but have to get something done. I've found myself adding in

extra doses of Tylenol to get through the day lately, which my doctor

knows I do add in at times, but have been taking more doses lately

than I really feel comfortable doing long term.

Over the past year, I've felt like my joint pain has gotten worse. I

brought it up at my April appointment, but we kind of ended up blaming

the problem on sleep due to the fact that I had not been sleeping well

(due to a med change that was caused by insurance). I have that issue

mostly resolved by taking a different med for sleep and have been

sleeping reasonably well in recent months.

Over the summer, even though I have been sleeping better, I've been

having a harder and harder time getting up in the mornings, extremely

stiff, and I find that even getting out of bed initially is difficult.

I then take my pills right away, and it seems to get better within

about 2 hours of the naproxen. The mornings are still really

difficult.

I've started to have much more shoulder pain as well. My shoulder

frequently hurts when typing or doing any type of repeated motion. I

think my range of motion has decreased, with my arm straight out at my

side, I can only lift it to right about 90 degrees and that is

painful. I have some days that are better and I actually feel

productive, but have many days that I am very slow. It seems really

weird to me that I will get some days, usually more towards the

afternoon, where I do feel quite a bit better and seems that I can

keep fairly active for an afternoon, but will virtually always just

drag for days after having a good day.

I've found more and more lately time that I really want to do things,

but I just don't physically have the energy to get them done, and or I

have too much joint pain.

The shoulder pain, while I would not consider it severe by any means,

is very limiting and does get very painful. It does scare me even

more, as I have a family member with shoulder problems, my mom has had

several different shoulder problems and is going to mayo this month

for a total shoulder replacement.

I have an appointment in the morning. I am debating if I should ask

for x-rays or a bone scan to be done again, as it has been about 4

years since they were done last, and my joint pain is much worse now.

I'm a little burned out with trying so many meds, and I am on a lot of

pills now, so am somewhat reluctant to even ask for any kind of med

changes.

I read many messages here, and I am know many of you have gone through

much worse, so I hate to whine. I've not been well enough,

consistently enough to work for a long time and I get really

frustrated when I can't even keep up with my tasks around the house.

Thanks for listening.