The next month was a whirl wind of activity and doctors appointments.  All the blood work continued to come back with low blood work counts confirming anemia, high levels of antibodies in my system, but the damage seemed to be confined to my blood and joints.  My liver, kidneys, heart, brain seemed to be unaffected.  Praise God!!  This disease can attack anything at any moment and cause damage very quickly.  My vital organs were still in good shape and that was a huge blessing.  I could continue to work and live life as a normal woman with bad blood work and joint pain.  The anemia affected every part of my life, but I was alive and well and thankful.

Immediately after the diagnosis, I began to have a plethora of symptoms.  I know a flare is coming on when my left shoulder joint begins to ache.  The ache is excruciating.  You can’t move, turn, or get comfortable.  I began to have Ibprofen by my side at all times.  I also learned I have Rayneud’s disease which means my fingers turn purple at the first glimpse of cold or stress.  I will blog about that craziness later.  Soccer was clearly out of the picture now and I had to drop out of a team I signed up to play with.  Working out became non existent as well.  By the end of the day, I was exhausted and could easily sleep 12 hours a day and then take a nap later. (To be honest-I could always do this, so that was not weird.)  I made an appointment to meet with my gynecologist to discuss about making babies.

The good news is: I have had to make adjustments to live with this disease, but I can live with it.  It is hard working full time and feeling this level of fatigue that is brought on by stress, but I am able to do it.  Odd things such as sun and hormones trigger the flares of disease activity, but I can modify my activites to accomodate.