Rheumatoid Arthritis

One thing I have learned about living with rheumatoid arthritis is to keep moving when you can. I was amazed when I woke up this morning and my ankle felt much better, sore but totally walkable. On my way home from work, I called my husband and offered to stop by the store to pick up what we needed. I was able to walk the store, we only need a few items, but was getting sore and tired when I was checking out. I'll keep moving as long as can. It would be nice to get some yard work done tomorrow, just have to see how I feel. I took the health assessment for my insurance, I have reserved feeling about it. I scored 35 out of 100. They tried to suggest I should be worried about my lack of exercise. I think that is the least of my worries as I love to go walking in the mountains, at dollywood, and even window shopping. There were also questions about how many cups of vegetables and fruits do you eat a day. I honest have no clue and guessed. I'm assuming I underestimated. The he

On the 18th I finally have insurance. Sadly I know I'll met my deductible fast, but I'm staying positive that this will give me much better care meaning less pain and more movement. My left arm won't extend open all the way. The elbow keeps swelling up taking up to 75% of the arm movement away. Thankfully this doesn't hurt unless try to force my arm to open more, which I do several times a day because I want it to move. I saw a doctor at the clinic about two weeks ago for the arm and he prescribed prednisone. The is a funny thing we mean a prednisone. Small doses once in a while help a great deal, too much and prednisone does more harm then good. For some reason when my body thinks it has had too much of prednisone it will swell up, make me dizzy, and/or cause my heart rate to up. This does ended up being too close to the dose I was just on a few weeks prior to this... I woke up on Saturday night with leg cramps. The cramps started in my right foot, so I pulled my l

Stress is one things that doesn't help. When a person feels stress their RA hurts even more. A great way to help reduce the pain is to find ways to help relieve stress. This blog is one of my ways to relax, share, and de-stress. Finding ways to relax is very important. Rheumatoid Arthritis it self is an address stress to life. There are time when the pain, tiredness, and the destruction of the body or lack of being able to move are just more than a person can bare. No one wants to have to need someone to do daily functions. Rheumatoid Arthritis can affect anyone children, women, and men. It is treatable, but not curable. One of the biggest stress is affording the medical treatment. If a person is able most Rheumatoid Arthritis can be treated by doctors and/or change of diet so a person can live a normal life. Left untreated and the RA damage will soon be visible. My life is currently dependent on my family. Without them I highly doubt I would be able to keep up the daily work t

Sometimes I wonder how much pain we have to endure. I still can't eat much. My jaw doesn't open as much as it used to and it often hurts when I chew. It is not my teeth, it my jaw bone. My left arm won't extend all the way. The elbow just won't open all the way. I keep trying to stretch or exercise to see if I can get the elbow to open more. My neck and back have been bothering me for the last two days. Today I Just hurt all over. Wrist, ankles, and toes had to join the fun too. I put a call into the clinic to see if I can get some prednisone. They don't like to give prednisone to me, but I know it will take the pain away for a while. It would be nice to eat a meal without hurting so much. It seems like there is tons to do. I'm trying my best to learn my job, which thankfully is a sit down computer dispatch job. The lawn needs mowed. The kids clothes need to be gone through for school starting in less than month. My husband is exhausted...he has to help

Thankfully the test results were not as bad as I though they were going to be. No surprise my number which indicated I need iron was down to 10.something. I'll have to continue to take iron everyday until the number go back up. Of course it doesn't help that my periods have been strong and worse than normal. Plus my rheumatoid arthritis flares up a week before my period. A period is already rough for women and can make them tired, making it a double whammy for my energy with the iron. The other problem with my blood work indicated something about allergies. Well I have a sinus infection so that explains that. I got some antibiotic to hopefully get ride of the infection. The sinus infection is a third whammy to my energy level. Now the best part, my rheumatoid arthritis is now affecting my jaw. It makes since the jaw has a joint to open and close my mouth. I've been having a hard time eating off and on for the last month. You would think I would have lost some weight but

The last few weeks have been very hard. Two weeks ago I got a call from my doctor on my blood test. (Because I take methotrexate I have to have a blood test every month before the doctor will give me a refill.) I don't know exactly what is wrong with the blood test but I have an appointment this Tuesday to find out. (It took some time for me to arrange a weekday off for the appointment because of my new job with Charter. I was in training and couldn't miss my training class.) What I did find out is that I'm sever anemic, meaning I need to increase my iron. I've already been tired but I thought it was because of a sinus infection I have had. This has happened before but the nurse said it was really bad but couldn't tell me more. Now I don't feel well. I'm cold all the time. I really want and need to see the doctor because I want to know what is going on and at the same time I want to do my best to show my new job that made a great choice hiring me.  (My bos

Vitamin D has always been a good for bones. So studies say people with arthritis may not get enough vitamin D. Vitamin D comes from things like milk, sunlight, and fish. Since I've been continuing to deal with pain my mother has suggest I give vitamin D a try. Today I bought some and took 1000 IU. The bottle says you can take up to 2000, but I thought I would try it slowly. Alls we can do is wait and see what will happen. Hopefully will see large improvements. Tell me, what do you think about vitamin D and the possibility is will help with arthritis pain? Vitamin D may also be a cause for being over weight as well. Read More Here

I have heard many people talking about Cherry Juice. People are claiming that it really helps with the joint pain. I have to agree that drink Cherry Juice may be the better way to go, but I'm not very found of most juice, nor is my tummy as juices tend to give me heart burn. What I found as a great alternative are these cherry juice pills. There is not much for review for this method. One person on amazon gave it two stars said she didn't notice any improvement. But according the this Research " many consumers are discovering that tart cherry juice and other cherry products can stave off pain ." Its natural and sure sounds like a good try. I'm interested to hear feed back if any readers have gave this a try. Please leave a comment below if you have had or are going to try the Tart Cherry pills.

Interesting! A new drug approved to fight RA called Actemra. Some of the side effects are very scary like tears in your stomach. It another one that would have to be infused taking around an hour according to the prescribing information. Looking at the cost there is this card http://actemracard.com/ that will give 80% off per infusion up to $4000. Well if they are paying up to $4000 which could be 80% the 20% out of pocket should be about $1000 (assuming the total cost was $5000.) This would need to be take once a month. That would be $12000 a year. Please tell me they are kidding. With the high cost and high risk.. I'll pass on trying this one.

Today is Sunday but it is my Friday as I thankfully have the next two days off from work. It has been a very long week. Many of the girls in our office have been sick and I feel a bit worn myself. I bet I'm catching something as well. My shoulders have been very painful. The pain wakes me up at night. I try to adjust my self to sleep on an angle on my back but once I fall asleep I must roll over. Today my toes also joined the fun. Every toe was just painful to wake on. For some reason the bottom of the heel of my foot has also been hurting this week. It hurts even worse when I don't have shoes on. With all this pain I was very thankful to find one last pill for pain left in the cabinet. I have been hoping to see the doctor at the local clinic.. but that may have to wait till next week. I find that moisturizer helps for some reason but I don't know why. Why doesn't matter too much as long as something helps. I going to introduce more fruit into the family diet.

We moved from Ohio to Tennessee for the wonderful view of the mountains and to get away from the snow. This year has been a bad year for snow and ice in Tennessee with more on its way tonight. I hear many co-worker feel the cold weather in their joints. I can't really tell because the joints have just been hurting. The worst is my shoulders. They have just been so bad full through the last week. I tried everything from heat, mussel rub, hot shower, and pain relief medication. Yet the shoulder continue to hurt. Sometime they "go out" just too painful to use or move. Last night I just prayed. I prayed for my shoulder pain to ease up. I woke up refreshed and my shoulder felt great. Through out the day my right should started to get a little sore, but I did a bunch of cleaning that needed done as well. I'm sitting here typing with my shoulder still feeling much better then they have all week. I don't know why but the shoulder pain stopped, but praying sure did

Living with RA is not easy. People living with RA want share their experience so they can help future generations. RA does much more then just hurt. I laugh as I call for my children to come lift out that full gallon of milk from the refrigerator. Sadly I can not lift up the milk, to me it feels like 30lbs. I'm not old, 31, but I sure feel old. Why is this RA so bad? Because the proper treatment is just too expensive to afford, especially without insurance. I have started this blog to keep tract of how living with RA affect me and to share what I go through. Maybe this will help someone or help my grandchildren who are likely to get this. It the start of 2011 and this year I'm going to share a weekly report of what is going with my RA and how it affects my life. Helium Living with rheumatoid arthritis