- More Questions

[Guest guest]

,

I read this with great interest. I apologize for still being slow as

molasses in getting a response to some of our other conversations to you.

I have a few more questions, please:

1) What meds were you on before all the arthritis symptoms began (especially

diabetes drugs)?

2) Were any of your x-rays ever abnormal?

3) How are your feet now?

----- Original Message -----

From: " /Celine Kossart " <kozys@...>

< >

Sent: Friday, February 23, 2001 2:09 PM

Subject: Re: [ ] need info

> At 10:59 PM 2/22/01, <mquiltn@...> wrote:

> > >

> > > I am 37yrs old. a few months ago my left hand(thank god I am right

> > > handed) started to feel stiff and my middle finger is always swallon

> > > and the knuckle is enlarged. I can no longer make a fist or wear my

> > > wedding ring. My right one sometimes gives me trouble, especially if

> > > I do too much typing or crafts. My feet sometimes feel like...well

> > > walking on legos in the morning. and my knees somtimes feel stiff.

> > >

> > a in OR

>

>

> Hi a in OR, this is in IL,

>

> Your symptoms sound a lot like mine. I was diagnosed in November of last

> year with RA. I am 47 years old and lost my job of 6 plus years last July

> 1. I had been remodeling my basement last spring on Saturdays. Every

few

> weeks I would get a bad pain in my wrist or shoulder. It hurt really bad

> like a sprain, and would wake me up, and keep me up that night. Then the

> next morning it would be fine. This went on for a couple of months. My

> regular doctor didn't have a clue. He said something about possibly a

> inflammatory, once and a while something or other for no reason, and then

> after a few months it would be gone. I thought this must be what I had

> because it seemed to stop for a good three months. Then late last July it

> came back in one wrist, then the other, then both - all in one week. One

> morning in August I woke up and said to my wife Celine, " Remember all

those

> pains I would be getting now and then that felt like sprains and hurt so

> bad? Well now I feel them all at once! "

>

> I had also been to two podiatrists because the balls of my feet were

> hurting and I had a toenail fungus that was deforming one nail and I

> thought maybe it was getting ingrown and causing some sort of infection in

> my right foot, which also was a little puffy. Both guys gave me medicine

> for the fungus. One podiatrist took three xrays of my right foot because

> he said the pain I experienced while he was examining my toes, etc. seemed

> to indicate a problem with the joints - however they looked normal. (I

have

> since found out that RA in the early stage has yet to cause joint damage

> which explains WHY the xrays looked normal!). I am just surprised that

> neither one of these guys suspected the possibility of early stage RA.

>

> The ring finger of my left hand became swollen and I had to remove my

> wedding ring, just like you. The middle finger of my right hand is also

> swollen and the finger is bending in. It slowly became increasingly more

> painful in my fingers, hands, wrists, shoulders, elbows, and knees. My

> doctor suspected some type of poly arthritis, but I didn't have (nor do I

> now), the classic symptom which is severe stiffness and pain upon

awakening

> in the morning which lasts a good two hours. He sent me for numerous

blood

> tests all of which came back negative except the one for rheumatoid

> factor. Now realize that all people with a positive on a rheumatoid

factor

> test do not have or will get arthritis, On the other hand, those with a

> negative on the test are not necessarily guaranteed being free of it

> either. So he still had nothing conclusive. He did notice what he called

> a RUB in my heart and sent me for an echocardiogram which proved his

> suspicion which was that I have pericarditis which is fluid accumulating

in

> the sac surrounding the heart. He put me in the hospital for a couple of

> days, not for the pericarditis, but because he wanted to start me on a

> steroid medication called Prednisone which would screw up my blood sugar

as

> I have type two diabetes. This means I don't have to normally inject

> insulin but now as long as I am taking the Prednisone I do have to inject

> insulin. He wanted me in the hospital so that the nurses could monitor my

> blood sugar and teach me how to inject myself.

>

> He sent me to a rheumatologist in Rockford, Illinois which is about 85

> miles north of here (I am in what's called north central Illinois, about

> 100 miles southwest of Chicago and 60 miles northeast of Peoria). The

> rheumatologist did some more blood tests and said I have RA. Like you, I

> also cannot make a fist though the rheumatologist sent me to a local

> physical therapist for my hands recently, which are the worst, and now I

> have some exercises I do which allow me to make a fist though my index and

> middle fingers don't want to cooperate. I also get pain in my wrists from

> typing which means I can only type in spurts. It hurts even more to

write,

> though, in the back of my right hand.