Monday: The Rheumatoid Factor

I'm going to try something new. Every Monday I will post about some aspect of having rheumatoid arthritis. Today I'd like to share with you how it all began.

Oddly, I don't recall the year or even the season when I experienced my first symptoms. Did I have my first attack in the spring as the semester ended? Or did my flare while driving the combine during wheat harvest occur first? Maybe it started during the fall semester. One would think that something so life changing would have it's own birthday on my life calendar, but that isn't the case.

In 1988, while attending Fort Hays State University, I lived off-campus in the tiny one-bedroom house I rented. The idyllic location surrounded me with brick, tree-lined streets that lead to ivy-covered campus buildings. I made a group of good friends and together we played co-ed intramural water polo (well, I tried to play, but I had no idea what I was doing) and co-ed intramural softball, went out on weekends and generally enjoyed a freedom we didn't understand we had. I jogged regularly, ate lots of starches because that was the healthy way to eat at the time, and drank my share of beer on the weekends. I worked part-time and took classes full-time. Majoring in music and accounting, I was an above-average pianist who loved the absolute-right-or-wrong aspect of accounting. Until the arthritis.

At first I felt exhausted and ran a low-grade fever, like a mild case of the flu that never went away. I developed an odd plaque-like rash on the underside of my left arm so that the first doctor I sought was a dermatologist. He performed three separate biopsies that resulted in no specific diagnosis. Next, the top of each of my wrists puffed up as if a small finger of liquid rested just below the skin. They ached. I ached.

Did I mention exhaustion? Do you know the weak, fatigued feeling you get when you have the flu or a major infection? Suddenly, for no reason, I felt like that all the time. I slept hours and hours. I looked normal so my friends didn't understand why I suddenly became a sleeping hermit. I continued my normal working schedule at Wal-Mart, but by the end of a shift my feet and ankles were so swollen that I called them "Flinstone feet" after Fred Flinstone.

Originally an almost-straight-A student, I began sleeping through and failing my classes. Too tired to even fix myself simple meals, my weight dropped. My lowest point occurred when I stepped on the bathroom scales and discovered I weighed under 100 pounds. Realizing I couldn't take care of myself, I called my mom. She came the next day to move me back home. I quit my job without notice and flunked the entire semester of classes.

Reading back over this post, I realize it's a real downer. I've considered leaving it unpublished. I've considered making it lighter and injecting a little humor. Ultimately I've decided to do neither of those. Those dark days gave birth to compassion, patience, empathy, humility and a host of other traits I otherwise would not have. Don't misunderstand. I do not claim to have those traits in every area of my life. Ha! I can be screamingly impatient. I battle pride and a surplus of other character defects. Just ask my family.

I also know that my situation is far from the most difficult situation out there. Some women are losing the battle with cancer and living their last days with their loved ones; barring anything unforeseen I'll be around a while. Some women are facing chronic illnesses that have left them bedridden and unable to care for themselves or their families; I've been reading a woman's blog that tells her story of living with sarcoidosis. She spent the Thanksgiving holiday in the hospital and is now home, but in tremendous pain.

This point in the story marks the end of the beginning of my current life. Like all births is was painful and no matter how much a woman loves her resulting newborn, the truth is...it's ugly. Sometimes the baby is born with a defect that, at first glance, is unattractive. Hideous even. But a beauty emerges.

I hope to make my life beautiful.