More wonderful medical news

Of course, I get all the fun stuff. I have both rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia. It never ceases to amaze me that some people do not know what either are. Yes, Virginia there are disgustingly healthy people out there who do not know about yucky unhealthy stuff.

So it overjoys me to read new research about my ailments. Especially when I find research that says the really lucky people who have both RA and fibro, have many more problems with RA than people without fibro.

One article is titled: Fibromyalgia Symptoms May Mimic High Disease Activity in Patients With Rheumatoid Arthritis. That title sort of says it all doesn't it? So even if I don't really have high disease activity, I will just feel like I do.

This article is from Egypt and is titled: The Impact of fibromyalgia on disease assessment in rheumatoid arthritis. I has some lovely charts and tables that compile the list of issues.

Table 2. Somatic manifestations of studied rheumatoid arthritis patients.

Somatic manifestations percentage (%)	Patients		P value
	RAF (25)	RA (25)
Widespread pain	100	28	less than 0.001
Sleep disturbance	68	32	0.011
Fatigue	92	52	0.002
Morning stiffness	56	36	0.156
Headache	56	24	0.021
Depression	88	40	less than 0.001
Anxiety	72	40	less than 0.001
Parasthesia	76	32	0.002
Cognitive symptoms	56	16	0.003
Dysmenorrhea	20	20	1
Irritable bowel syndrome	16	4	0.157

RAF: rheumatoid arthritis with concomitant fibromyalgia, RA: rheumatoid arthritis.

When I was diagnosed with both RA and fibro, my doctor told me I probably would not be able to tell which ailment caused which pain. Sometimes I can but sometimes I can't. And sometimes I just don't care.

But now that I know fibro makes my RA feel worse, I'm not going to suck it up. I think I should switch to chronic whininess. I think chronic whininess outweighs chronic pain. Some research news inspires whininess.

In the know

If you are perpetually sick/ill, you are in the know on how we feel. Someone came up with a list of 20 items but a few stuck out for me.

• You aren't quite sure what it means to feel "100%" because you're usually hovering at a solid 80% on a good day.
• Sometimes doing even the simplest of tasks feels like a five hour workout. Can I nap yet?
• By some miracle if you are actually not sick, you usually overexert yourself so much that you'll be sick again in a matter of days.
• Your immune system feels like its one weekend away from collapsing completely.
• Naps become more important part of your day.
• "You don't look sick to me". No, but my kidneys feel like they're failing so there's that.
• When you finally feel healthy again, it's an emotional experience for you. 

I'm not sure I'll ever hit that last one again but occasionally I can sit still and feel no aches, pains, or anything else for about 30 seconds.... Until I move and then it all starts up again.

And no, if you  haven't walked the walk, you can't tell me how I feel.