It's a long time since I've posted. I've needed space and time to process. I flung myself into work and have used obsessive over-working as a way of distracting me; so I wouldn't have time to think or dwell on how bad I've felt on so many occasions.
This morning, I've started a video diary of my symptoms to show my Rheumatologist out of desperation.
When my pain first started I was told I had reactive arthritis and possible Rheumatoid Arthritis. Then I was told I had Palindromic Rheumatism. I spent a year healing after my snowboarding accident (that bought on my joint pain), whilst struggling with severe joint pain and mobility problems, believing I had PR.
My scans throughout have failed to show any inflammation. My blood tests are only ever slightly raised and I'm negative for the rheumatoid factor. This is not unusual. Research shows something like a quarter of people with RA and similar conditions show negative bloods. My new rheumatologist then told me that she doesn't see Palindromic Rheumatism as a diagnosis, more a way of describing a range of inflammatory arthritis symptoms, that are as yet undiagnosed.
Pain used to move around my joints making it hard to do everyday things (typing, walking, picking up a mug), and my back pain seemed to settle deep down into my hips, deep in my Sacroilliac joints, making bending, sitting, turning and all manner of things very painful.
Throughout all of this I've maintained a very active lifestyle. I've had 2 dozen sessions with different physios. I've had hydrotherapy. I lost over 2 stone. I was swimming 5 days a week immediately after the accident as the warm water helped sooth my joints, but now I go to the gym 4 days a week. I go for a walk every lunch time because being still causes my hips to lock up. I do yoga stretches most nights and most weekends I am out hiking. I am strong and I am flexible; and whilst I am still over-weight, it is not fitness or muscle-tone causing my hip issues.
In the early hours of the morning, every morning, I wake up in agonizing pain. My lower back completely locks up and the pain wakes me up. I have to make tiny repetitive movements to bring some mobility back to my lower spine/hips. Turning over in bed requires a lot of effort and I have to grab the headboard and pull myself over isntead of simply turning. Sitting on the edge of the bed before I get up leaves me crying out in pain, as does straightening up to stand and shuffle in to the bathroom.
This doesn't start to subside until a couple of hours after I get up, once I'm half way through my morning gym routine. It's the same day in day out.
Getting my bottom half dressed in the morning is an ordeal, and can often leave me in tears. Getting to the gym requires an enormous effort and sheer stubborn determination, and the constant effort leaves me utterly exhausted. The constant pain, means I have to battle to maintain my positive, happy attitude.
Some days I get really low.
In the last year, I've had 2 steroid injections. The 1st was like a miracle cure, and I was very well (still some pain in hips, but nothing in other joints and no morning stiffness). The 2nd took longer to work and didn't work for very long, but again, It was a great help. It has worn off now, and in the past 2 weeks I'm back to tears, crying out in pain and feeling really low as the pain and stiffness increases day by day.
I had to cancel my active outdoors plans last weekend, and I still feel really down about it.
I can't get in touch with my Rheumatologist. The phone line just rings and rings. I am desperate to get booked in for another steroid injection as it's my birthday in 2 weeks and I've got loads of hikes and camping trips planned over the next few weeks - but without a steroid injection I fear I won't be able to do any of the things I so badly want to do.
My mood has dipped, I feel scared and desperately low to the point of feeling depressed. I'm very tearful, my brain is fuzzy and I feel perpetually tired.
I still don't really know what is wrong with me. I saw a rheumatologist who told me it sounded like inflammatory joint pain (well duh!) and he said it was probably now time to start me on DMARDs. I saw a different rheumy after that, who said there was no evidence to start me on DMARDs and to simply take more Tramadol, which I'd already told him doesn't touch the stiffness and only dampens down the pain a little anyway.
The average time for a Ankylosing Spondylitis diagnosis is 9 years. NINE YEARS before the disease shows itself in scans. So is it Palindromic Rheumatism or is it Ankylosing Spondylitis or something else, like Sacroilliac Joint Dysfunction? Either way, it's inflammatory in nature and I don't understand why I'm not on a regular cycle of steroid injections. Oral steroids (which make me manic and psychotic, so I can't take them) are so easy to get from my GP, why not the injection?
To think that I may be in this limbo, fighting every few months for the only medication that we know works, makes me feel incredibly depressed and I really don't know what to do. I am constantly afraid that I'll be told I'm being discharged by my rheumatologist too.
I don't know how much energy I've got left to keep on fighting and maintaining what looks like a normal life on the surface.
Thanks for the link.
Swelling that isn' in a joint
advice on sulfasalazine and the sun
Palindromic rheumatism 
No inflammation showing on my ultrasound so why do I have constant pain in my feet and hands? 
