New seeking advice

[Guest guest]

Hello,

I'm 36 and I have had achy joints since I was a teenager. Just put them off to

bursitis. Then, when I was 19, I was told I couldn't donate blood plasma

because I had a marker for lupus in my blood tests. I freaked and took the

letter to my doctor and he reassured me that the marker did not equal actually

having lupus. I tripped on with my own life.

My shoulders froze a couple of years later and a couple of years after that I

developed raynaud's phenomenon, a thoroughly frustrating disorder. My shoulders

froze up a couple of more times through my 20s but what became truly alarming

was literally a pain in the butt.

I had practised yoga for nearly 10 years. Making sure that I was gentle on my

shoulders during outbreaks. Then, 5 years ago, I developed a fire in both hips

and my right knee. That fire came and went for a couple of years then 3 years

it stayed for good. In around that time I developed a nodule on my larynx that

had to be shrunk with steroids prior to surgery and voila! all the pain when

away in my joints (I wasn't expecting that). Finally the on fire joints was

frustrating enough I went to see my doctor.

And got nowhere. Fast.

Then my jaw dislocated...permanently. Arthritis so bad in my right jaw the bone

just wore away. The left is well on its way too.

I sought out help from a chiropractor for the hip pain and he discovered that a

joint in my lower back (which had troubled me since I was a teenager) was very

arthritic.

Back I went to the doctor and I was referred to rheumatologist, who sent me home

with a prescription for Vioxx, glucosamine and a admonition to stop

yoga...forever.

The vioxx didn't help and neither did the glucosamine so I stopped taking them.

I was demoralized. I started icing my hips and knee every day for hours just to

stop the pain.

I recently went on Naproxen which has really helped with the worst parts of the

inflammation. Although I can still feel the inflammation on days when it is

really bad. But my blood pressure has sky rocketed on that medication.

I have a lot of pain in my knee with any kind of jumping action and I have to

walk out my right hip in the morning and after sitting for any great length of

time.

I'm being re-referred to the rheumatologist BUT my family doctor made it sound

as though I had a far fetched chance of actually seeing him/her.

All tests on my RH factor have turned out negative.

I joke that I should put myself on the knee/hip replacement waiting list now but

really this is not funny, it is quite terrifying. I am a pretty active person.

I love walking, hiking, swimming, biking. But these activities are becoming

more and more painful.

Oh, and now I have a joint in my neck that is snap, snap, snapping. That and I

can only stand for 1/2 hour before my lower back spasms and I have to do a

forward bend to loosen it up. Which looks strange when I am in business social

situations. Oh and my index fingers are aching now too.

I am extremely puzzled as to why it would be far fetched for me to even get in

to see the rheumatologist.

belle