In limbo - time stands still!

[StarlightinJuly]

Only 2 weeks to go until my gallbladder op - managing on a low fat diet to keep gb symptoms at bay. Pain meds are helping with painful joints. Worried about op due to heart condition but it has to be done as gb neck is blocked and wall is thickened due to infection.

Rheumy appt was a bit confusing. He said that Methotrexate and Sulpha made a very strong combination and could well have brought about such a widespread infection due to super-efficient lowering of immune system. Am off all DMARDS now until 4 weeks after op ( 8 weeks in all) but he said that it's up to me whether to go back on Meth or Sulpha - apparently I won't be going back on both. I asked his advice and he said that Meth is the "Gold Standard" but, having thought things over, I believe monotherapy is meant to be next to useless. And if the Meth was potentially the cause of this infection (of course the blockage allowed an infection to start) should I even consider going back on it or would all effective DMARDS maybe cause the same? Where to go from here? I must remember that, immediately before being rushed to hospital, things were not great with my RA either - not much improvement after 6 months of Sulpha and just over 3 months of Meth, hair falling out since well before Meth but thyroid tests were normal. Too much to think about! I think I must just get the op over with and take it from there as it's been difficult to tell what to put symptoms down to.

Just rambling to myself but hope anyone reading this is having a "good" day

[Hidden]

Hi Julie. As someone who has gallstones and intermittent gallstone flare ups myself I relate to your experience. I tried Sulpha last year and it made me very ill so can't take it.

MTX is much more effective and easier to tolerate for me and the combination of Hydroxichloraquine and MTX seem to be working well in tackling my RA on the whole although I don't feel great on them just now in other ways.

I know Hydroxy is a far less worrying drug re it's impact on the immune system and you don't even have to have the blood monitored on it - so how about starting on a low dose of MTX with Hydroxy as your combination of therapies? I know a lot of people here find MTX works well as a monotherapy so just because this MTX/ Sulpha combination didn't work out for you I see no reason to exclude MTX from the equation at a lower dose once your gallbladder op is out of the way?

Hair can fall out for other reasons than DMARDs or thyroid - Lupus for example or Menopause or stress? I think and hope you will find that once your gallbladder has been removed you are less prone to infections and feel much better generally - I know others have told me that this is the case for them. Tilda x

[sylvi]

Julie i hope it goes well for you and you recover very well. Drugs we don't want them,but we can't do without them and we don't know what damage is done to our bodies.

|Wishing you well, love sylvi.xxx