Living with Rheumatoid Athritis

I had an appointment with the rheumatologist on the fourth of September. She was absolutely brilliant and very thorough. The upshot is that not only do I have rheumatoid arthritis but I also have osteoarthritis - mainly in my knees. Obviously this is a bit of a blow but just something that I am going to have to deal with. As a result my medication has been increased. I am still taking the same dose of Methotrexate (she didn't want to increase it because of my lung function) but my Folic Acid increased to daily. I will also be taking a daily dose of Sulfasalazine. I confessed that, at times, I have been taking the painkillers that Marian has for her back and she has also prescribed them as they are proven to work for a while. A side note. Just as I was about to publish this I received a phone call from the pharmacist at my GP's surgery about the new medication. She wanted to check that I was happy with everything and told me that I should get the prescription this week. I am imp...

Just back from an amazing Cropredy festival. For the first time I was in field 6 which is much closer to the stage. We were still a wee bit away but I managed reasonably well with the help of a stick and Marian, who made sure that I was fed and watered. If you have never been to a festival I can highly recommend this one - you can even stay in Banbury and get public transport to the field. A quick answer to a couple of comments. To the person who h oped that I could still play my lovely mandolin - I'm afraid that I neither own, or can play, the mandolin, lovely or otherwise. I can manage around three chords on the ukulele though! Please let me know who you are and I'll maybe see you in Shrewsbury! I was also asked if I had changed my lifestyle. After speaking to the rheumatologist I have not changed what I eat, although I am trying to lose weight by eating less. I don't drink as much as I used to, especially beer, although I have not given it up entirely as I still go to ou...

I am determined that this will not be a "poor me" blog but I cannot write it without saying what I am going through. Over the last few weeks I have had several extremely painful flare ups. They are fairly typical of what you would expect with increased pain, reduced mobility and excessive tiredness. One of the other symptoms is weight loss, unfortunately I have not "suffered" this. At the moment everything has settled down to pains in my knees and shoulders, and stiffness and pain in my hands - especially in my index fingers. (Note the use of the Oxford comma in the preceding sentence. Impressed?) I am using paracetamol to try to dampen the pain and, at the moment, the soreness is more or less what I can cope with. It also seems to ease off as the day wears on. It is still difficult to walk any distance at a sensible speed though and it gets more painful after a while. This has led to an unexpected bonus though - I have access to field six at Cropredy. This field is...

Well this is new - not only is this being written on a ship on the Danube I am also writing this blog on my phone instead of my laptop so it may be a little shorter than usual.  A proper benefit of being immunosupressed is that I get an extra Covid injection. It was supposed to be during the holiday but I was able to get it moved to the Saturday before and I even got a cup of coffee. Moving it forward may have been a mistake as, never having had a reaction before my arm started hurting - and did so for ten days. Just breaking off to do my soundcheck with Fairport Convention.  Right, back now. To catch the ship we spent four days travelling by bus. On the whole the journey was fine with exceeded company but I did find it a little difficult to get on and off the bus at times. Sitting wasn't bad but, as my knees were still painful walking around was more challenging as I would have liked. I needed some breaks so it was an excellent opportunity to check out some of the local hoste...

 OK - maybe I can't boogie but the title is appropriate as I am writing this partly to fill in time before the Scotland game starts. I am also aware that it has been around three weeks since I wrote anything. This is because nothing much happened for a wee while. I really wish that there was no real reason for writing this now but unfortunately there is. I have had a really annoying flare up. We were away in the caravan with friends - not very far in fact Forfar. This was also a bit of a trial of the van before the festival season starts. The first couple of days were fairly uneventful, at least arthritis wise, but on the third I woke up with a massive pain at the back of my head - not a pleasant experience. Fortunately the headache disappeared quickly but the soreness that developed in my neck and shoulders stayed for a while. The next couple of days were reasonably pain free but the next week was no fun. It started off with pains in both hands which were so bad that I couldn'...

It's been a while, sorry, but sometimes not a lot happens as far as RA goes and I assume that you are reading this to hear more about the rheumatism than the other, sometimes very boring, things that happen in my life. Let me know if you do and I will put more of that in the blog. A day or two after returning from Ibiza I had a cold - not sure exactly where I caught it from but it really hit me quite hard - especially as I rarely get colds. I was back to work on the Wednesday but the following Monday was a horrible day as I still had a stinking cold and also had a bit of a flare up so I ached all over. I must admit to feeling a bit sorry for myself and, in retrospect, I probably should have stayed in bed but, like most teachers, I feel guilty if I don't go in. I felt much more like myself on Friday but it did make me have a wee think about retiring properly. Let's wait and see on that! On Tuesday 7th I had a phone call from the Early Arthritis Nurse which was pretty informa...

So far it appears that warm weather may not do too much for my RA as I have been in Ibiza for a few days and I am still feeling pain in my knees. It did rain a lot for a couple of days though and I have had no other pain apart from in my hands. I am down to 5mg of steroids a day, with only two days left on them, and the RA has not got significantly worse. Today was my 8th Meth dose so maybe it is working a bit although it really is hard to tell as i am not sure if I am meant to be totally pain free while I am on it. I am getting a phone call on Monday so that's something I will ask about.  I've still got blood tests do do. I am a total baby about getting needles stuck in me but regular blood tests are a part of my life now so I'll have to get used to them. Having said that, the last one was entirely painless.  Marian and I have been at a music festival in Ibiza and we both joined a ukulele group having been told that they welcomed total beginners. Marian was much better tha...